When in Venice
by Lilith1631
Summary: Stationed in Venice, Harry is trying hard to stop Death Eaters from smuggling new weaponry back to England. He only wishes his partner would focus more on the case and less on his personal obsession... Pre-DH
1. Chapter 1

**Summary:** Stationed in Venice, Harry is trying hard to stop Death Eaters from smuggling new weaponry back to England. He only wishes his partner would focus more on the case and less on his personal obsession... (Pre-DH)

**Chapter one**

The villa overlooked a small square that played as the forecourt to a large church. Small children were down on their hands and knees in the street, marking the cobblestones with chalk drawings while parents and tourists looked on from the café across the kerb.

The walls of the lodge were painted terracotta, but most of the lead had faded, fallen, or washed away in the perpetual rain of the city, making the villa look run down and drab. The terrace accessed through the French windows of the bedroom was shaded from the sunny day by an iron wrought canopy covered in climbing ivy. The quaint veranda was complimented by a rusty table and single chair perched next to the hanging baskets of posy white flowers.

Like all houses in Venice, the villa's ground floor was dilapidated and abandoned, but on the upper levels of the building were rich inhabitants, sitting on their terraces, enjoying the picturesque view of Venetian life. One of these people was Draco Malfoy.

Draco placed the diminutive coffee cup down on the table and leaned back in the chair. It gave an ominous creek at the welding as he contemplated his hatred of Venice. Or any part of Europe that wasn't England. The tea in any foreign country was a cheap imitation of the good English patriotism, the coffee was always too sharp, and the cups were too small. Damn those cups. Draco sent a glare to the cup that sat innocuously beside him. The cup continued to sit there, unaffected by the infamous Malfoy Death-Glare.

Draco gave one last glower to the 'cup', ultimately disappointed that it hadn't cried tears of coffee dregs, and looked at his watch. Coffee glaring had lasted three minutes. He sighed and looked down at the urban square below him. Four more days. Damn.

xx

"In retrospect," Draco leaned against the kitchen counter, "this is not a very good place to hide. There's too much water. Makes running away very difficult."

"Hmm."

"For another, it's very unhygienic. All the wood's rotting, the paint is peeling and the drains make things smelly…too much water."

"Hmm…"

"And sure there's plenty of water, but no one does anything useful with it, do they?" Draco shook his head. "Snape once told me that you can't use the canal water to make tea."

"I'd imagine not. Too many micro-organisms."

"I was very disappointed. There's never enough tea. I had to go to twenty different shops for teabags this week. Twenty! That's…" Draco turned and looked at the near empty Tetley's packet sitting near the kettle, "A thousand teabags! Approximately." He turned back to look at the bowed head sitting at the table. "That's a lot of teabags."

"Frankly, I don't care," snapped Hermione, closing her book and standing up from the table to leave. "I'm trying to research. Go and bug Harry!"

"He's on a mission!" cried Draco to her retreating back. The kitchen was somehow emptier without Granger's reading murmurs and Draco felt very put out. He hated Venice.

xx

"HALT!" yelled Harry, running past an old Chinese couple at breakneck speed. "Stop or I will resort to restraining you!"

"Fuck you!" A red spear of light shot towards Harry. It was poorly aimed and only stung the side of his ear before slamming into the old stonework of the bridge. Harry wanted to refrain from spell fire because the bridge was old and a polluted canal ran below the suspended relic, but Muggles were nearby and allowing McNair to simply fire at him and those around was not acceptable. Grabbing his wand, Harry paused in his run and took a deep breath as he aimed. "Stand down!"

"Fuck you!"

"_Petrificus totalus!"_ An oldie but a goodie, the spell hit McNair dead in the back and halted his getaway, his wand falling uselessly from his hand. Harry ran over and quickly bound the enraged murderer, ignoring the looks from several stunned Muggles.

"You are being arrested for conspiracy against the Ministry, participation in the illegal organisation of Death Eaters, possession of illegal weaponry, and you will be taken into questioning for the murders of those named against you by the Ministry. You will also be questioned about the whereabouts of certain Dark Lords and followers under the supervised use of Veritaserum. Anything you say can and will be used against you in court before the Wizenagomot. If you choose to plead innocence, a lawyer can be provided for you by the Ministry. If you plead guilty, you will be taken into further questioning by the Department of Mysteries. How do you plead?" Harry finished spouting rights that he didn't think the man deserved and tapped his wand against McNair's lips. An expected string of obscenities flowed forth immediately. "How do you plead?"

"You fucking half-breed scum, when the Dark Lord gets hold of you, he is going to make you _beg_ for death and -"

"Come on, McNair. Plead something so I can go get a cup of tea. All this running has made me dead thirsty." McNair seemed a little stunned by Harry's words and blinked dumbly at him for a second before gathering his wits.

"_Portus!_"

"EUGH!" screamed Harry, kicking the empty spot. "Fucking Portkeys!" Harry continued to beat up the bridge with an enraged vigour, stomping his foot into the dusty stone and imagining McNair still stood in place.

Harry was just about to pulverise the viaduct a little more when he was suddenly blinded by a bright blue light. Blinking away spots, he looked at the old Chinese couple clicking their camera at him, then to McNair's forlorn wand. A quick _Obliviate_ and a melted camera later, Harry had pocketed both wands and left, leaving only a handful of dazed Muggle tourists behind.

xx

"Hey, Weasley! Wait up!" Draco pounded up the flight of stairs to the hunched figure on the third landing.

"Oh no," muttered Ron, hanging his head on his chest. _So close_. "What is it, Malfoy?"

"Did you know you can't make tea from the canals?"

"Erm…no. No, I didn't." Ron looked around, searching for some form of escape.

"Yeah, apparently it's unhygienic. I don't see why they can go ferrying people around in those little boats but you can't drink it. A good Transfiguration Spell ought to do the trick, I should think, but Granger says there are these things called micro-organisms and -"

Ron put a hand on Draco's shoulder to halt his words and smiled forcefully. "Yeah, micro-organisms. Hey, did you know that Justin is going out to a bar tonight? He did mention something about needing some company…"

"Really?" Draco's face lit up with enthusiasm, "That's brilliant. Do you know where he is now? I could ask if I can go along, too. You going?"

"Erm, sure. I think Justin is in a meeting right now with Kingsley. Top floor." Ron had no idea where Justin was. All he knew was that the top floor was the furthest away he could send Malfoy without violating safety procedure and orders. Draco nodded happily and made to move towards the stairs.

"Hey, they sell tea at bars too, right? I've heard things about these Muggles bars…crisps instead of hors d'oeuvres, only beer - terrible things."

"I think so." Ron shrugged. Seeing the beginning of a scowl appear on the other man's face, he amended his statement. "I mean, of course they do. Everywhere sells tea…it would be a crime not to, right?" Draco smiled indulgently down on Weasel-King.

"I do believe this is the first time I've ever felt a smidgen of respect for you, Weasley. Man after my own heart." Draco made his way up the stairs, bellowing down the hallways, "DOWN WITH COFFEE!"

Once the blonde head was out of sight, Ron sighed in relief and sent a quick prayer to heaven for Harry to come back soon.

xx

"Oi, Flinchy!" Justin turned around at the ruckus and immediately wished he hadn't. Smiling politely, he walked over to the banister where Draco Malfoy had slinked himself over.

"Hi, Draco. What's up?"

"Did you know that you can't make tea out of the canal waters?"

"Probably not. All the bacteria and micro-organisms, right?" As if he cared. Justin leaned against the banister, looking up into Draco's deep grey eyes and gleeful face.

"Yes, micro-organisms! Have you been talking to Granger, too?" asked Draco. "Are you as concerned about the blatant tea drinking of those boys from the fourth floor?"

"I think they drink coffee, actually. Don't they have their own kitchen up there?"

"That's besides the point," stated Draco imperiously. His eyes turned to slits as he remembered the empty teapot he had found in the sink that very morning. Damn the fourth floor! Damn them and their tea-stealing thievery! Turning his eyes back to poor naïve Flinchy, he said, "I heard you are going to a bar tonight. Can I come?"

"I'm not going to a bar." Justin wondered who was the traitorous sod who had clearly foisted the blonde menace down to him.

"You're not?"

Disappointment riddled Draco's face. Justin sighed. "We're supposed to be hiding, Draco. Going to a bar isn't exactly inconspicuous. Just face it, we're stuck here until next week." Draco sagged against the stairs and pondered for a moment.

"I wish Potter was here. At least he's fun enough to duel with me."

Justin narrowed his eyes a little, but then he sent a wide smile when Draco looked around again, "Yeah, I miss him too. He'll be back in four days. Missions like these always take their time."

"Damn Potter. How come he got the mission and everyone else is stuck in this STUPID house? I haven't smelt fresh air or tea since last week."

"I thought your bedroom had a terrace."

"The Fidelius Charm. Stops the Muggles from seeing in and the stale air from going out." Draco sighed melodramatically. "When I next go on a mission, I am going to buy so many teabags…"

As Malfoy shook his fist threateningly at God only knows what, Justin had an incredible idea. "Draco…Kingsley did mention something about a surveillance mission over breakfast today…"

"Oh?"

xx

Draco was becoming more and more disgusted with Venice every moment he stayed in it. Despite the air of unkempt charm that the city provided him as he took a short boat ride along the canals, he was indefinitely appalled at the overwhelming presence of the city mascot. A lion. Why not a bear? Why not a kangaroo, and even a snake? Where the hell were the bloody snakes?! Kingsley sure had a sick sense of humour to choose this place as his stakeout point. The sun was too hot, there was a distinct lack of shade, and too much Gryffindor memorabilia! Damn Kingsley and his trickery. Two hours now and the tip of his nose was turning the palest pink, a shade of severe sunburn for any of the Malfoy descendents. Draco was beginning to doubt whether or not this was really a mission or Kingsley's ruse to not buy more tea. The cheap sod. Draco was beginning to doubt the alleged Death Eater activity of the island, feeling more inclined to believe in a beverage conspiracy from inside the Order itself.

It was quarter to five in the afternoon, as stated by the huge blue and gold zodiac clock face. He had another fifteen minutes until his shift was over and he had to return to the dingy headquarters, with its coffee drinkers and lack of entertainment and fresh air and big cups. And until that time, he was going to continue to take in the sights of St. Marco's Square from his vantage point atop of the basilica, lions and all. Goddamn it.

The square was packed with Muggles milling about in lazy circles, weaving in and out of the marble columns to view the shops embedded in the ancient monuments, and listening to the music played from several restaurants that had been ingenious enough to set up stages for small orchestra bands. Muggle children were riddling themselves with diseases, standing like statues with dried sweet corn in their palms, feeding the pigeons like in Trafalgar Square.

"Bored!" cried Draco suddenly, scaring the pigeon perched on the stone railing next to him. As it fluttered down to join its fellow poultry, Draco leaned over the roof of the glorified church to look down at the plebeians below, his eyes tracking the bird's decent.

xx

"How much?" asked Harry. His words were not understood, but he gestured to the china mask that was painted in bright blues and oranges.

"Forty euro!" exclaimed the saleswoman, protecting her stall viciously from thieves by jangling the multitude of glass necklaces around her throat at any bystanders. Harry scowled and shook his head.

"No, that's too expensive," he said. Her blank expression completed her imitation of Professor Trelawney. She grabbed hold of the mask and held it out to Harry, her head tilted as she held out her other hand for money.

"Forty euro!"

"It's too much," Harry stepped away from her, his hands held up in a show of surrender to prove he wouldn't allow this extortion.

She looked at him for a moment, jangled her necklaces at him and said, "Thirty-five euro!"

"Twenty!"

"Thirty-five!"

"Twenty!"

"Thirty-Five!"

"Twen - ARGH!" A pigeon had taken a low dive, swooping dangerously close to Harry's head as it made its way towards a little boy who was throwing birdseed up into the air like rain. Recovering from the shock, Harry turned back to the stubborn woman. "Twenty!"

"Thirty-five!"

xx

"I don't fucking believe it!" Draco exclaimed. He gave a whoop of joy that he would later deny and spun around to leave the rooftop. He had to push his way past a young woman getting her photo taken next to a lion-statue, who would later show the picture of the 'handsome blonde sexy man' to her friends ten days later when the negatives were blown up to proper proportions.

Draco pegged it down the consecrated flights of stairs, ignoring the gold mosaic ceilings, and ran through the main hall of the basilica to the exit, acquiring some stern looks from a crowd of nuns who were congregating against a water basin set into a statue of two cherubs. The hot Venetian air was stifling in comparison to the cool church interior, and Draco's lungs protested the vigorous stimulus in such ungodly weather. He elbowed his way through hordes of Muggles, undiscovered Mudbloods and pigeons to fling himself at his unsuspecting victim.

"POTTER!"

xx

Harry toppled forward. The vanilla and pistachio ice cream that he had been savouring was now sludged down his white shirt, but that was the least of his worries because whatever caused the collision was now clinging to his back. What if it was another Death Eater avenging McNair? Harry let his empty, half-nibbled cone fall to the floor and delved a hand into his trousers, pulling out his wand and spinning around, shoving the tip of the weapon under a pale chin.

"Oh, that's friendly," said Draco sarcastically, pushing the wand away and pulling Harry into another hug, "You have no idea the hell I have been through in the last two days! No one understands my plight, I'm bored and out of TEA!"

Harry squirmed a little. Draco's warm breath was sweeping the shell of his ear and the ice cream now squelched between both their chests. Harry put his wand away and put his arms around Draco, returning the hug awkwardly. His favourite shirt being ruined by thawed dessert had never entered the scenario when Harry had envisioned the first time he held Draco in his arms.

"We'll go buy a cuppa now, eh?"

"Oh Potter!" swooned Draco dramatically. "No one will ever understand me as you do, my fellow tea-lover, you!" They separated and Draco finally noticed the sticky evidence of their physical contact over his own chest. "MY SHIRT!"

xx

"So, what you are really saying…" Harry smirked. "Is that you got a mission to find me?"

"No. I told you. It was merely coincidence. St. Marco is a very popular place. Only good thing worth seeing in Venice. No water in St. Marcos, is there? Did you know that you can't use canal water for tea?"

"Who told you that?" asked Harry, ripping open two paper packets of sugar and pouring them into his cup.

"Granger."

"Aww well…it's a good fantasy though, isn't I? Venice; the city on the tea."

Draco's face was overcome by a blissful expression before he turned his attention back to his own cup that barely passed his standards of what made a good tea, despite it costing nineteen euros. "I don't understand why I can transfigure blood into tea, but not water. And why can I transfigure water into blood? It's madness!"

"Blood into tea?" Harry laughed and asked curiously, "Can you turn water into wine?"

"Of course not, don't be stupid. That would go against all laws of nature!" Draco shook his head pityingly at poor, silly Potter, "Pfft! Water into wine. Good one."

Harry decided that he was not going to inform Draco of the works of Jesus Christ in case the blonde began an unbridled verbal dispute against religion. While Draco explained the tea conspiracy that had apparently occurred at Headquarters during his absence, with Kingsley as the main perpetrator, he took the chance to study his partner.

Draco's hair fell over his grey eyes and the split ends stuck to his cheekbones because of the humidity. A few freckles spattered over the bridge of his somewhat sunburnt nose and cheeks, pert lips babbled nonsense of paranoid delusions and every so often a pink tongue darted out to moisten each lip. Draco liked to speak with his hands, which were waving about manically to draw shapes of twaddle in the sky. Harry was just about to admire the cut of Draco's trousers when he became aware that he was supposed to designate an answer to a question he never heard.

"Erm, what?"

"I said, did you catch McNair?"

"Sort of. This morning at the bridge of Sighs. He had an internal Portkey on him, though."

"I hate those. But oh well, that means we have time to go stock up on teabags before we have to report back at HQ. Sound good?"

"You drink too much tea."

"No such thing."

xx

**Author's Notes:** Yep, that's right. New story. It's a long one, but I promise Draco becomes somewhat less annoying as the fic goes on, if only because he grows on you. Hope you enjoy, weekly updates. All reviews welcomed.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter Two**

Harry woke with a steady, hot stream of breath playing across his left nipple. It tickled a little and distracted him from the morning light playing in from the open doors of his balcony. It was a fairly clear day with only the odd wispy cloud that did not impose anything. It seemed a shame he had to spend the day inside. If he tried hard enough, Harry could pretend it was someone else's hair tickling his chin. Justin was just stirring when a loud thud impacted against the bedroom door.

"Potter, stop shagging and get your arse out of bed!"

"Go 'way!" yelled Justin, nuzzling into Harry's armpit. Another thud sounded against the door and then another voice echoed from the hallway.

"Malfoy, shut up!"

"Ouch! Fuck you, Weasel!" There was another thud, further down, like someone throwing a shoe, "Potter, open up!"

Justin wrapped his leg around Harry's thigh and whispered bad morning breath into his ear, "Don't go. Ignore him."

"POTTER! I haven't got all day!" There was a moment of silence, followed shortly by, "Fine! But tea is in ten minutes." Loud, obnoxious footsteps faded away and Harry was left to see Justin scowling at him.

xx

The trip between the second and third floor was but one flight of stairs and a minefield of abandoned Weasley products lining the skirting boards. One wrong step and you could end up as a canary. Harry, unlike Hermione, who had one day came downstairs with zebra stripes for skin, was an expert at travelling through this particular stretch of landing.

After departing the staircase, the first door of the third floor belonged to Fred and George. Instead of a welcoming mat, their threshold sported scorch marks and powder stains. The second room along also belonged to the twins and the door was left hazardously open for any dangerous experiment to take on a mind of its own and make a break for freedom. The next door was the bedroom to one rather clumsy inhabitant; Tonk's bedroom door was painted bright yellow to hide all the impact splinters from her battles with gravity. The final inhabitant of the third floor was one Draco Malfoy, whose bedroom door or stretch of corridor territory gave nothing away about himself. No Weasley merchandise had made it's way this far down the hallway and the door still remained intact. However, there was a reason hardly anyone ventured to the third floor landing. It was formally known as the 'Mental Ward'.

Harry didn't bother with knocking, he walked straight in. The room was predictably decked in silver and green paint but the furnishings were sparse, merely a double bed in the centre of the far wall and a chest of drawers behind the door. Standard issue fittings for all rooms, but Harry preferred this room over his own because of the beautiful veranda that his own room did not sport. While his was merely an iron railing and a chair, Draco's balcony was like a forest of calming solitude. "What took you so long?"

"Who do you think?" Harry settled himself down on the creaky chair and looked down at the muggle Venetians making their way to church.

"Does Flinchy not know how important the first meal of the day is?" asked Draco, sliding a cup of piping tea over to Harry and then offering a digestive biscuit that, in the blonde's opinion, ought to last through till dinner.Harry took one and dunked it into his cup whilst Draco was mimicking the motion opposite. They both ate their meagre breakfast in comfortable silence, simply enjoying each other's company and the sense of routine they had built through their budding friendship.

"I bought twenty packets of tea yesterday," informed Draco, "and how many are in the kitchen now? Half! Half a flipping packet! I think it's those boys from the fourth floor."

"I thought they had a kitchen of their own."

"They do."

"Hmm…" Harry saw Draco sneaking a sideways glance at him and he let himself smile. "We'll go check their cupboards after Collab." Draco's face settled into a satisfied Cheshire grin and he took a sip of his own precious tea which had been sweetened by the biscuit dunkage.

"What have you got today?"

"Earl Grey."

"Oh, swap?" pleaded Harry. He didn't particularly like Earl Grey over green tea, he just really, really liked the cup that Draco had. Exactly like his, but the handle was marginally bigger. Draco took another sip before switching their drinks around and tentatively tasting the green tea. The beverage seemed to have passed the test because Draco cupped the cup affectionately between his hands and turned his gaze down to the courtyard again, turning his head so that Harry viewed him in side profile.

"I hate Collaboration meetings. Why can't we just have areo-memos or something?"

"You just like origami."

"It's prettier than staring at Weasel for two hours."

Harry scowled. "Oh hush."

"Do not silence me on my disgust!" Draco gave a dramatic movement with his digestive, raining crumbs all over the churchgoers below, and glared at Harry. "Life would be so much better without Collab meetings. Less violence, for one. Later lie-ins, as well….and we don't have to listen to Granger recite the textbook she absorbed from the umbilical cord."

"I'll tell her you said that," threatened Harry, picking another digestive out of the packet.

"Go ahead, see if I care. She doesn't scare me." Draco threw his shoulders back and adorably puffed out his chest. Harry wanted to lick the nipples pressing against the cotton shirt. "And neither do you. Threaten me all you like, I still think Granger needs a stick-removal operation and Weasel needs a hair transplant. I've told them both that I'll be willing to pay the medical bills, but neither of them stand to reason."

"I'll take your tea away."

Draco hissed loudly, "Oh, you're one of _them_. And here was me thinking you slept on the second floor. I see Jeff has lured you into his gang of tea-stealing bandits. Soon you'll be drinking coffee up there," Draco nodded his head to the windows above them, "and spouting off diabolical plans of herbal-larceny!"

"Look, you stop mouthing my friends and I'll swear never to sleep on any floor higher than the third floor." Harry's skills of negotiation were amazing. He marvelled at how sated Draco was with the arrangement and they sat for another forty-five minutes before either of them spoke again.

"We've got to get going. I don't want to have to sit next to Jeff again."

"You do know his name is Robert, don't you?"

"I've renamed him. He looks like a Jeff. You never get a thief called Robert." Draco threw the last few dregs of his tea into the flower boxes, petting the petals of a daisy affectionately before walking back inside. Harry laughed and threw the few drops of his own tea into the flowerbed, and also sending a little pat on a random flower. The action was as near to owning a pet as either of them could get.

"Hurry up, Potter, and stop molesting the vegetation! Jeff might already have stolen my seat!" there was a bang of something and then, "Bloody fourth floor! Steal everything of mine. Potter, have you seen my Quick Quotes quill?"

xx

They were late. Every part of the kitchen was being utilised for seating. The countertops, the kitchen table and chairs, the floor, everywhere! Fred was even sitting in the sink, his knees drawn up by his ears awkwardly with a notepad balanced on his head, a large orange quill scribbling away Hermione's words. Hermione stood at the fridge, pointing with her wand at various diagrams and lists that were pinned up by magnets. Her voice was low and steady as she explained about the Apparition Spells of the island, when she noticed the late arrivals.

"…imagine if you will, a huge bubble covering the whole of the island. No one can get out except customs…so in other words, stop trying to Apparate outside the city - it's not going to work. Internal Apparition and Portkeys are allowed, but please, everyone, remember only to Apparate at the appearance spots, not just any old place. We have to keep Muggles from - YOU'RE LATE!"

The whole room jumped at the sudden shrill shout that interrupted the monotone lecture. All the heads in the room swung to the door were Harry stood with Draco, sheepishly scrunching the back of his hair.

"Sorry, Hermione. The Kettle had misplaced his quill." Harry jerked his head to Draco and the Quick Quotes quill in his hand, "It was under the mattress for some reason."

"Don't call me that," said Draco, completely unfazed by the fact he had just interrupted the weekly meeting…again, and waltzed his way over to the other side of the room, perching himself on the microwave. "Move, Jeff."

"My name is Robert," replied Jeff, crinkling up his nose, either at Draco or the embarrassment of being forced to sit on a breadbin.

Harry was just contemplating how to commandeer Ron's chair when Hermione, keen on revenge against any intrusions to her meetings, said, "Harry, how about you tell everyone about the McNair lead." Damn her.

"Sure thing." Stepping over Aurors and other Order members, Harry made it to the fridge and stood in front of thirty seven studious pairs of eyes. "Erm, hi. So…erm…well this week I was following a lead that McNair was purchasing the Flesh Wands under the Rialto bridge, but when I went there…well, lets just say that unless he was buying washed up litter, the lead was a bust." Harry dug a hand into his pocket and pulled out a tourist map of Venice, tacking it to the fridge door with a banana magnet. Pointing to the Rialto Bridge, Harry then pointed to the bay at the south of the island. "I found him at the Bridge of Sighs - obviously, Kingsley got the wrong bridge name. We fought, I had him bound, but he had a Portkey. He got away…he could be in Mexico for all we know."

"You can't Apparate or Portkey in or out of the island without customs authority," bleated Hermione in the same voice she used to say, 'You cannot Apparate into Hogwarts'.

"Oh, yeah." Harry gave a small smile. "Then he's still here. But I did one thing right." Harry dug into his pocket again and many of the onlookers leaned forward curiously. Holding McNair's wand up to the light, the blotchy red wood and dank metallic smell made everyone gasp.

"You've got his wand?!" laughed Hermione incredulously.

"It wasn't that hard. He dro -"

"He put up a real fight. I had to do some pretty difficult healing spells on Potter, he was covered in bruises. Apparently McNair is a bit of a bitch slapper," informed Draco, smirking at Harry. The microwave seemed to sense the lie and gave a ping, making Jeff fall off the breadbin in surprise.

"Erm, yes," Harry coughed, then smiled, "Big fight. Hand to hand combat and all that. Had to, erm, wrestle the wand out of his hand."

"You are amazing," stated Hermione. Harry froze like a deer in headlights but Hermione had rushed forward and seized the wand, "We'll do a dissection now. Make sure that it is not just his real wand. Meeting adjourned."

"Thank god!" cried Draco, the microwave giving two beeps to reflect Draco's ecstatic mood. Draco was already stuffing away his parchment and quill to escape with the rest of the group when Hermione caught his exit.

"Get back here, Malfoy. You're the Dark Arts expert, you need to be here for this."

"So close," whimpered Draco, watching Jeff smugly leave the kitchen. Draco had turned his head in time to see the smirk on Harry's face, so he smirked himself and gave out a little whine, "Granger, I cannot possibly stay. I'm asthmatic, you see, and only the smell of Potter's bed sheets can cure this horrible pain in my chest. Toodle pip!"

"Sit down!" Granger's eyes were narrowed and irate. Draco decided that walking out the room anyway would only test that rumour from seventh year that she had infernal vascular abilities. So, instead he went to make a cup of tea.

Making a cup of tea was like a potion experiment. First you needed to set out the equipment. Draco began to pull out random drawers, searching for a teaspoon. He found lots of knives and folks in one drawer, but no spoons. Deciding that a tablespoon would be sufficient, he placed the implement by the kettle then went in search of a cup.

Over the other side of the kitchen, Hermione was casting a Severing along the length of McNair's wand, splinters smattering off the instrument with deadly precision into Ron's arm. "Oi, watch it! That hurt!"

"Stop being such a baby, Ronald."

_Where are all the cups?! Damn the fourth floor!_ Draco kicked the cupboard at his feet and glanced unsavourily towards the mountain of dirty crockery sitting in the sink. Sneering, he turned on the hot water and watched as the sink slowly filled, steam pouring out of the tap. Next step…ingredients. Sugar…check…digestives…pitifully stale, but check…wait…Draco sniffed at the biscuits suspiciously and other than the wheaty aroma, they seemed like perfectly normal snacks. Something wasn't right. Sniffing the sugar, Draco still couldn't pinpoint the source of the rancid copper smell hanging in the air. Spinning round, Draco scrunched up his nose at the golden trio and McNair's desecrated wand. "EUGH! What is that smell?!"

"It's McNair's wand." Hermione pointed to the dissected wand that laid on the table. Nestled along the split length of the wood was a not unicorn hair, nor phoenix feather or Ashwinder Ash, but flesh. Human flesh. The strip of tissue was bright red, but green around the edges as the meat began to turn, and the wood had soaked up most of the excess blood, turning the timber rich and dark. The aroma of rotten flesh stank through the kitchen, making Weasley dive for the sink and empty his stomach. Potter and Granger were both wafting the air above their noses.

"You'd think they'd find a more hygienic weapon-of-doom, wouldn't you?" commented Draco, turning back to the counter to locate some teabags.

"Don't joke, Malfoy. Flesh wands are very dangerous!" Her face had turned pale from the smell, but she valiantly lectured him. "Admittedly unhygienic but the special core makes them very powerful. If all the Death Eaters were equipped with wands like these then -"

"Complete mayhem, death and destruction ten fold, hostile takeover and world domination, yadda, yadda, yadda. Stop quacking, Granger. I know they're dangerous toys."

"Toys?!" bristled Hermione. "Draco Malfoy! Flesh wands are not toys! They are so potent that even Squibs can use them with the same ease as an Auror or -"

Draco spun around, the teabag he was placing in a smudgy cup fell to the floor, forgotten. "Potent?" he repeated, an unholy light glinting in his eyes.

"No, don't!" yelled Harry, lurching forward. Too late.

Draco had whipped across the room at lightening speed, snatched up the two halves of the wand and slapped them back together. Holding the fractured tool around the cannibalistic core, he pointed the unstable rod at the water coming out of the tap. "_Sitis__ Tetley__!"_

As soon as the words had passed his lips, the wand sent violent black sparks not only from the tip but all the way along it's spliced length, sending a hot jolt of energy up Draco's arm and into the crook of his elbow. It hurt like all hell and he stumbled back into the sink which was now overflowing blood onto the floor. All the moisture in the air had turned rancid and they all breathed out copper mist as blood splattered over the floor, ceiling and walls. Draco blinked at the wand in his hand, and then at Potter's shell-shocked face through the pink fog, Granger's furious expression, and Weasley's backside, who was still hauling the contents of his stomach into the nearest drain.

"…erm…whoops?"

xx

**TBC**

**Author's Note:** Hi guys, this fic is going to updated every week, so feel free to place it on alerts. All reviews welcomed, this is a novel length, 15+ chapters, and no, it's not a WIP - Enjoy!


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter Three**

"These really aren't my colour," said Draco, looking despairingly at his feet. "Have you got any in green?"

"No. Only red."

"Well, as least I'll match the wallpaper." The Wellington boots were the most offensive piece of footwear Draco had ever had to don, and the damp smelly mop presented to him did not lighten his foul mood one bit. The only up side to the whole fiasco was that he had used amazing logic to get Potter in on the work order as well.

xx

"I was doing my job! Why have I got roped into your mess?" The mop gave a loud, wet slop into the pink water and Harry scowled over to Draco who was also making similar sloshing noises into another bucket on the opposite side of the kitchen floor.

"It was my mess?!" Draco cried, indignation making him sprinkle rosé droplets over his white shirt. "It was McNair's wand, it's _his_ mess!"

"Pfft! You're a very funny man, sometimes," commented Harry, waggling his mop to drain off the excess water. "What were you thinking, anyway?! '_Sitis Tetley'_?! You actually told me yourself that you cannot make water into tea!"

Draco gave an infuriating grin over his shoulder and continued to mop up blood from around the table legs. "Does this look like tea to you?"

"You actually knew it would turn into blood," ranted Harry. "You knew!"

"I did not! I thought that those fleshy-wands were supposed to make the impossible happen. Why else would everyone want one?"

Harry tired to clean up the congealed gloop from under the fridge, but the soggy mop only made a puddle upon the caked layer of blood. "Have you not been paying attention to Collab conferences? They are wands that allow the caster to cast any Dark spell without having to feel the emotional baggage, not for making water into tea!"

"Emotional baggage?" Draco repeated, laughing. "Is that a technical term?" Harry flushed the same colour as the ceiling.

"Well… I may… have fallen asleep during that part of the conference…" He coughed. "But what's in a name? Your aunt told me 'you have to really mean it' to cast a Dark spell. See, emotional baggage!"

"The technical term," began Draco, who knew almost everything there was to know about the Dark Arts and tea brands, "is Catharsis."

Harry crinkled his brow. "Doesn't that mean getting things off your chest?"

"It's the term also used for the emotional and magical drain one feels when they cast a spell. You don't notice it unless you're tired or injured, or it's a big spell. Like the Killing Curse. These bloody miracle wands stop Catharsis." Draco stuck his tongue out childishly. "See, I listen. Just not to Granger, her voice is like Binn's lectures mixed with owl talons on a nail board. Imagine… no Catharsis… just imagine how many people you can kill then! And never get weak or pass out… hundreds… thousands…"

Harry raised an eyebrow "You look psychotic with that look on your face." Draco blinked dreamily. "So, no Catharsis. How did you jump to the conclusion that you could make tea with one of those wands?"

Draco shrugged out of his daydream and went back to spring cleaning, "Just figured the reason you couldn't directly transfigure water into tea was because there was too much Catharsis." Draco dumped his mop back into the bucket and looked around the kitchen, which was still clearly suffering from two of the ten plagues of Egypt. Water to blood and insects. "If Granger would just give me back the wand, I could Transfigure all this blood into tea…" Harry didn't trust the idea of Draco with _any_ wand, let alone a wand as potent as the one Hermione was supergluing back together upstairs.

"Get back to work."

"But I'm thirsty!"

xx

"I'm not quite sure how I feel about my delicates fraternising with your under things. Seems a bit depraved."

"Because their both boy-under things?" asked Harry, draping a towel around his waist and leaning back against the machine. Draco shook his head and pointed to himself, then gestured towards Harry in a symbolism of their connection.

"Do I look homophobic to you? Of course I don't care if they're both boxers. It's not my right to question which lacies my Devlin Whitehorn boxers choose to get sudsy with, I'm all for elasticised ecstasy. I do not judge."

"It's good to hear you're not discriminating anyone, Mister Death Eater man," commended Harry. Draco seemed to ignore that comment, but his forearm was suddenly itchy as he wrapped a towel around his hips and threw his own underwear into the drum reluctantly. Standing back from the machine, Draco gesticulated to it.

"Make it work."

Harry sighed and moved to pour in the powder, then press the quick-cycle button. Though Draco was willing to entrust his clothes inside the whirlpool-in-a-box, he wasn't silly enough to put his fingers inside its mouth. He stood well back from the washing machine and allowed Potter to handle the Muggle contraption. Once it flurried into life, Harry leaned against the shuddering appliance and watched Draco.

"You've still got blood on your knee."

"Get your eyes off my knees," said Draco sharply. It was all Potter's fault that they ended up sword fighting with mops and then ended up on their arses on the blood marinated floor. Harry blinked.

"They're nice knees."

"Stop trying to console me, I know they're the knees not of Greek gods, but of knobbly Englishmen. Do not look Potter, you'll make my kneecaps blush." Draco pointed to the blood coagulating on the joint. "Too late. Look how shy my knee is!"

Harry raised an eyebrow, not only because Harry knew that Draco knew this was blood, and knew that Harry knew, but the way Draco was bending over to inspect the stain led to a wonderful event. Draco Malfoy, losing balance in a towel. Harry was too stunned to laugh.

Sprawled on the floor, flat on his face, legs and bloodied knee now spewed at odd angles and the towel, which Harry noticed with a flush, had ridden up one thigh to reveal the round of his bum. Harry stepped over Draco's splayed ankle to stand between his angled thighs and leaned over. "Malfoy? Malfoy…Draco? Are you dead?"

Harry bent down and tapped the blonde's shoulder. Draco groaned and looked over his shoulder laboriously. "Don't laugh at me. I'm a pureblood. Situations like these are merely an affirmation of my regal grace."

"I wouldn't call it that. More like regal clumsiness," corrected Harry, one eye straying and then snapping back to the blonde head.

"Whatever. Just help me up, there's a breeze ticking my wand." Draco reached behind himself to adjust his dignity and that was the moment the door opened.

"Oh." Harry turned, eyes wide in horror at what he must look like, leering over an ex-Death Eater spy's seemingly bloodied and crippled form. "I'll leave you to it then." Justin turned on his heels and left.

Harry turned his gaze to look at Draco, who merely rested his head against the cold floor and said; "I bet Flinchy isn't going to call it regal grace, either, when he's telling the Weasel."

xx

"Why does he get to go?! I'm the Dark Arts expert!" Draco kicked the bed leg in defiance. Harry felt it wobble beneath him and stretched a little more over the mattress to soak up every vibration.

"He will actually _do_ the mission instead of going to the nearest shop to buy tea!" cried Tonks, annoyed at her fellow Mental Ward neighbour and his bloody drinking habits. Robert continued to look smug behind her in the door threshold. The man was not stupid enough as to enter Draco's domain.

"I wouldn't have to keep buying more if that fucker stayed in his own kitchen!"

There was a little stain on the ceiling where the air had grown damp with canal water and made imprints in the paint. Harry would rather think it was Draco's good aim than the Venetian humidity.

"Leave the tea out of this, Draco. If you want a mission, go see Kingsley." Tonks, always the voice of sensibility. However, Harry could see her crimson red hair out of the corner of his eye. Draco liked to boast that he always had an affect on women, but Harry was sure if Tonks' violent follicle reaction was what he had in mind when he made statements like that.

"Fine. I'll talk to Kingsley. I'll go out, follow the leads, catch the bad guys and come back to HQ, be hailed as a hero, and drink some tea." Robert looked positively green at the though of Draco being 'hailed as a hero' and Harry could share the sentiment. Draco had no idea what the spotlight was like. Its lights were hot and made sweat drip off his brow and while Draco's brow would not be diminished by a healthy gleam, Harry was sure he would prefer life out of the spotlight. Draco would surely prefer the low lights, in the wings of the stage, like him.

"No solo missions left," stated Robert, moving behind Tonks' bristling form.

"Well… Well, Potter will be my partner, won't you, Potter?"

Harry didn't take a second to think for his answer. "Course I will. Only if I can have a cuppa when we come back, too."

Draco snorted, and Robert and Tonks left for their reconnaissance mission casting a look at the two men left in the room together. "He's been stealing my teabags again."

"How did this stain get here?"

"Good aim."

xx

"He slipped!" cried Harry, angry at the injustice.

"Sure he did."

"He did!"

"Hmm." Justin turned on his side, presenting his back to Harry and stayed silent for the rest of the night. Harry lay staring out of the balcony doors to the edge of another balcony, donned in creeping vegetation and white flowers.

"He only slipped."

"Whatever."

xx

Harry really wished that Draco would put the magazine down. It was appallingly crude and offended his Gryffindor sensibilities greatly. "You're a pervert."

Draco turned the page over and his eyebrows gave a funny sort of wiggle that Harry hoped meant disgust. "Cor! Look at those! They must be spelled!" Apparently not.

Harry decided to brave it and peer over Draco's shoulder. He instantly regretted it and wondered how Draco could sit there, drinking a cup of tea and look at _that_! "You're filthy. And so is that."

"You wouldn't know a good bit of porn if it wiggled up to you and offered a lap dance."

Harry snatched the literature from the man's grip and flittered through the pages with feigned enthusiasm. "Oh wow, look at those feeding sacks. All that fat! God, the only thing that could make them better is if the baby was still attached to them! And those feminine folds - oh how I want to bury my head there and have her squelch her -"

"Stop! You've ruined boobies for me, now. Gimme that back before you destroy the magic that is the vagina." A brief scuffle ensued, which Harry won on account of Draco was careful not to spill a drop of his beverage.

"I don't see what's so special about vaginas anyway, they're -"

"That's just the sort of comment I'd expect from the man playing 'wax the broom wood' with the world's most effeminate man."

"_We've_ had sex?" asked Harry, theatrically shocked.

"I take offence to that."

"Actually, me and Justin are fighting at the moment." Confiding in Draco was like drinking coffee. You think you are going to get a good kick out of it and instead you have a lung full of beans.

"Oh? Pray tell."

"He thinks he walked in on us about to do -"

"I have a fair idea what Flinchy thinks," interrupted Draco, his eyes narrowed over the novelty cup. "The perv. His mind only wonders like that because he's gotten a look at my snitches. Go to him and tell him that his crush is not tolerated. Tell him that you lust him and that you want his imaginary babies and that he should try with all his might to forget about me."

"…Your ego astounds me."

"Thank you." Draco was about to say something else, but Robert walked into the kitchen, his face scrunched up in disgust at the floor and walls, and made his way over to the kettle. Robert's form was slouched over, the only physical sign of exhaustion from his seventy-two hour mission; he clearly couldn't make it up the stairs to his own kitchen. Harry watched Draco watching Robert, who clearly didn't accept fatigue as a reason to extract his teabags from the clay container that was clearly marked '_DM's Tea - touch and perish!_'

"Evening, Jeff," greeted Draco, narrowing his eyes dangerously. Harry tore up the magazine while the blonde was distracted.

xx

**TBC**


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter Four**

Justin reached across and twirled a lock of hair at the nape of Harry's neck, unknowingly ripping out a few from the root. Harry winced imperceptibly and looked over to Draco who was wincing a lot more noticeably. He could see out of the corner of his eye that Justin was grinning widely over the spectacle and the affectionate hair petting was a precautionary measure to make sure he didn't go to his friend's rescue.

"LET GO, LET GO, LET GO, LET GO, LET GO!"

"Do you find it okay to go hitting other members of this team?!" yelled Hermione, yanking the shell of Draco's ear, her neatly trimmed nails digging into the cartilage, "Do you find it acceptable behaviour to go harassing other Aurors?! You are supposed to be a professional, which means no violence!"

"It makes my job very hard if I didn't use force to - ARGH! LET GO, YOU WITCH! I don't want a new piercing!"

"Say you're sorry!"

"NO!"

"Say it!"

"Make me!" Hermione grabbed a fistful of hair, yanking it until a few fine strands fell from her fingertips. Draco cried in horror and surrendered. "Nooo! Not my hair! My precious hair!"

"Say you're sorry to agent Ruskin!" Harry knew how hard it was for Draco to look over at Robert, who was sitting on the floor from the decking he had just received, his left eye blue and swollen, surrounded by teabags, and have to apologise to the man. However, Hermione had fingernails of steel!

"…Sorry, Jeff."

"My name's Robert."

"Let go of me you stupid wench, I said I was sorry!"

Hermione released her grip and Draco dropped to the floor to retrieve the teabags that had been spewed onto the floor. He grouched loudly as each teabag was covered in a red stain. "I cant believe it! I've got to buy _MORE_ teabags!"

"I'll come with you," offered Harry. Justin ripped out a few more hairs.

"You cannot leave this house unless you are going on a mission," stated Hermione, helping Robert off the floor.

"Where's Kingsley? He'll give me a mission!" Draco then frowned at his own sentence, "Well…okay, he loves Potter though, so…Potter, go get us a mission."

"Kingsley is away with a liaison meeting with new spy."

Draco sighed in memory. "Ah, I remember liaison meetings. They always had the best tea there. Rich…flavoured…not too much sugar, and just enough milk to set the whole thing off nicely. I want to go to liaison meetings!"

"Well you shouldn't have gotten caught then, should you?" snapped Robert, recoiling as Hermione poked his black eye.

Draco snarled from the floor, his hair ruffled, looking adorably pathetic as he was surrounded by sodden teabags. Harry wanted to rip open all the bloodied bags and sprinkle tealeaves into Draco's bellybutton. "It's not my fault I was caught. If aunty Bella was so fucking nosy, then she wouldn't have walked on me having my own private liaison with…" Draco smirked but didn't finish the sentence. Harry raised an eyebrow. The mystery behind Draco's convergence from double agent to Order of the Phoenix member was shrouded in secrecy. Justin gave an uncomfortable fidget in his lap and ripped out a few more hairs. Harry though he'd develop a bald patch. "Who do I go to for assignments?"

Hermione pulled her shoulders square. "Me."

Draco groaned. Harry just sent a smile to Hermione. They'd get a job.

xxx

"This was not what I meant." Draco looked around at the large queue and crowds of tottering tourists and loitering wizards. He spotted one old witch whose wart was overtaking her face, and a group of security wizards trying to capture her escaped owl, knocking over a mountain of luggage as they jumped about. "I hope no one expects me to catch poultry."

"No," said Hermione, she smiled, "you're going to be working with Customs."

"Customs!?" cried Draco. "How is prostate exams going to make me a hero? Draco Malfoy, defender of the innocent and professional anal prodder?" A squeak emitted behind him and he looked round to see Potter's face flushed red. "Sorry. I didn't mean to be homophobish…just…I am not sticking my hand up _her_!" Draco pointed to the lady cuddling and cooing at her renegade owl.

"You're not going to have to do physical screening," stated Hermione tiredly, rubbing her hand over her forehead.

"Sore luck, mate," said Draco, elbowing Harry and inclining his head towards a tall, dark haired man with handsome features standing in the queue. Harry elbowed him back.

"He's not my type."

"You'll be doing the leg work," stated Hermione.

"His legs are quite nice too, don't you think?" encouraged Draco, waggling to the man again. Harry scowled and inserted his elbow once more between Draco's ribs. After a brief elbow scuffle, Hermione snapped.

"Both of you, behave! Otherwise I shall assign you to separate cases!"

"Sorry, Hermione."

"Yeah, sorry, Granger." Draco sidled up beside Potter, looping one arm around his waist and attempting to pull off a sincere expression. "We'll get along just chummy. Don't worry about us. What is the job?"

Hermione scowled a little but walked them over to two officers, each holding a leash. "This is Officer Harts, and this is Officer Sultral. You'll be working with them. If there is a chase, help out in pursuit. Otherwise, you're mainly on the lookout for Death Eaters trying to get through Customs."

"Why would they try and get through Customs?" asked Harry, eyeing up the animal curled at Officer Harts' feet with interest. Draco slapped him.

"To get the wands back to England. You can't take over the government from abroad. Dingbat."

"Don't hit me."

"Don't ask stupid questions then."

"Don't hit me and I won't ask stupid questions. You'll give me brain damage."

"You were like that from the womb."

"You -"

"Shut up, both of you!" snarled Hermione. Draco blinked. Did Granger…snarl? He watched her nostrils flare in rapid succession and her magically straightened teeth glinted from beneath her pulled-back lips. _Oh yes. Rabid_. "Just…do your bloody jobs!" She spun on her heel and marched off. Draco turned to Officer Harts and asked where the break room was when Granger's shrill voice yelled from over the heads of the crowds, "AND NO TEA!"

"Damn."

Harry just smirked.

xxx

Draco was bored. Harry could tell by the way the blonde was restlessly striding in circles, his eyes prancing dutifully over various faces but eventually snapping back to the little airport restaurant that was situated on the other side of the immense crowd. "It's calling to me, Potter. When do we get a break?"

Harry checked his watch for the fourth time in the same hour, knowing that if he didn't at least inspect his wrist, Draco would presume him to be lying. "Another seven hours."

"Seven hours!" cried Draco.

"Well, no. Technically seven hours and twenty eight minutes."

Draco threw his hands up in the air, fingers spread to the sky in a manner undignified to that of an on-call Agent of The Order of the Phoenix. If he was wearing Auror robes like Harry, then he would have shamed the government with his expression of woe. "Oh Potter. Woe is me. See how I am woed."

"I don't think 'woed' is a word."

"I might die of thirst. Why do the bloody guard rats get drink and I have nothing? I could dehydrate into non-existence." Harry thought that Draco looked like an angry kitten when he glared at Officer Harts' Niffler that was currently lapping at a puddle of its own drool from the tiled floor. Draco looked envious but green matched his childhood patriotic complex. _Go Slytherin!_

They stood behind the Officer Harts and Officer Sultral, scanning nameless faces of tourists as they went through screening processes, watching the trained Nifflers detect not only every gold item upon each disgruntled witch, but sniffing out drugs, illegal objects and most importantly…flesh wands. Other than a few fake Gucci watches, Harry felt that the past three hours had been unproductive. Any Death Eater attempting to smuggle the wands back to Britain would surely have the commonsense to use Polyjuice or cosmetic spells that would disguise them from authorities. Harry was willing to agree with Draco. "It's a conspiracy. Granger is purposely trying to bore us to death." _Yeah! Damn you, Hermione. Can't we have something more exciting than this?!_ "And she's trying to take my tea away from me. I think she's in cahoots with Jeff." _Okay, I don't completely agree. Draco's clearly nuts._

"You're nuts."

"I think being a hazelnut would match my eyes. Do you think I could run over there, just for a quick cuppa?" Draco looked longingly across the way and Harry thought he was insane.

"You're insane. You won't make it. They'll notice." Harry jerked his head to Officer Harts and Officer Sultral who were supervising their muzzled Nifflers sniffing up an old Hag's skirt. Both Officers were reporting to Hermione directly about their performance. Draco looked at the two officers, his nose scrunched up in distaste for their low rank and their perverted version of a body-search.

"Cover me."

"No, definitely not!" objected Harry. Draco moved his gaze to Harry and Harry knew instantly that he was going to help. Draco's eyes were wide with silent pleads, each eyelash countable across his pale cheeks as his bottom lip was captured between two nervous teeth, nibbling his mouth blood red with sulkiness. "Oh all right! Just be quick." The pout disappeared instantly, a quick flash of a smirk and Draco had vanished. Quick as a flash, the blonde dodged through the horde of people, in the direction of the beverage counter in '_Café Port'_. Harry looked around nervously, hoping that neither officer would cut short their physical search on the warty witch's owl anytime soon.

xxx

"Hey, where did you two get that tea from?" Harry thought Officer Sultral was a simple man if he couldn't make the equation of tea obsessed blonde man, plus tea ban from superior, equals trip to the only café in the Portkey centre. Draco handed him another packet of sugar.

"From the land of Oz." Draco had been watching too much Disney again; he was starting to become sarcastic in Muggle popular culture. Never a good sign when trying to be an undercover spy among pureblood supremacists; Death Eaters never tended to watch Mary Poppins. Draco opened a small carton of milk and poured it laboriously into the reusable cup, supervising each drop that diluted his precious brew. He looked at the two officers indifferently as he stirred the mixture with the tip of his wand and then took a sip. Harry looked away as Draco's eyes rolled in their sockets. "Hmm…pure bliss. There is nothing greater than - oi! Fuck off you mangy rat!"

"He's only doing his job," smirked Officer Harts. Draco glared at him and then down to the sniffer-Niffler twitching it's nose against his crotch. Harry knew Draco would have dropped his scolding hot tea on the lucky creature if it wasn't for how valuable the drink was to its owner.

"Get him off!"

"Down, Edward. Down," said Officer Harts lazily, enjoying the way Draco was now trying to hold his tea out of the excitable animal's reach.

"Ge'off, you bloody -"

"Just let him sniff you and then he'll leave you alone," said Harry, watching the proceedings with a general lack of interest. He was on duty, after all.

"He's after my tea!" cried Draco, holding the cup up above his head. Edward continued to sniff at his crotch, and Officer Sultral inquired quietly into Officer Harts' ear if an invasive search would be necessary.

"Nifflers can't smell tea leaves," stated Officer Harts, tugging the lead lightly.

"If you can train them to smell drugs and objects, they must know what tea smells like, surely?" Harry leaned forward and petted Edward's gnarly furred head. Edward continued to sniff at Draco's expensive trouser hem.

"Genetically they can't recognise it." Officer Harts gave a stray giggle as some of Draco's drink sloshed onto his blonde hair.

"I don't care if some stupid beast can't sniff it; I don't want it sniffing my tea anyway! Back off, mutt!" Draco leaned down and growled loudly at the Niffler which took this as a command to sit, and sat prettily at his feet, its nose still twitching sceptically at between the blonde's legs. For a long moment, grey eyes stared at beady black ones, each sizing the other up. Draco lowered his cup, and took a sip, sending a mocking smirk to the animal. "I don't like you."

"And I'm sure it doesn't like you either," replied Harry, his eyes scanning the two wizards issuing Portkey-newspapers to a group of middle aged men in red caps beneath the alcove labelled 'Departures'. "It doesn't want your tea." Harry took a sip of his own luke-warm drink.

"Hmm, it wants my milk though."

Harry choked his oolong tea out of his lungs. Draco continued to hold the milk carton to the Niffler, having decided to make love, not war. Officer Harts patted Harry on the back.

xxx

"My feet hurt. My neck hurts. My head hurts. My bones hurt. My _being_ hurts! I am The Hurt."

"Lets get back to HQ. My bed has been calling to me for three hours," Harry sidestepped an Indian family who had just Portkeyed into the alcove cleverly named 'Arrivals' at the main exit to the building. He was just about to step into the evening's cool air after the extraordinarily long shift when a clatter and 'oops' behind him signalled that he would not be getting home within the next half hour. Turning around on the top step of the flight of stairs that led to the cobbled streets of freedom below, Harry looked back into the Portkey Centre and saw Draco helping a young lady with long blonde hair back onto her feet. He'd obviously not been careful enough of the importing group of giggly women that had arrived at, ironically, Arrivals.

"Sorry about that." Draco released her elbow and she flipped her head back to fan her hair back into its usual position. Its usual position seemed to be half way across her face, though, and she blew at a strand from the corner of her mouth with exasperation.

"Oh, it's no pro - hey!" Her eyes narrowed in recognition and Harry felt that he would have to enter the building again to save his partner from what was probably a vengeful ex-lover. "You blo -"

"Sorry, don't mind Carol," said one of Carol's friends, jabbing her elbow into her friend's ribs and stepped closer to the pretty blonde man who had accosted them. "Sorry about her, she's got her wand in a knot - jetlag and all."

Her voice was full of mock and sarcasm, and Harry knew Draco's interest had been piqued merely at her aristocratic drawl, her big brown eyes and long dark hair that went well with her 'don't fuck with me' smirk. She was like his _yang_. Harry huffed and turned back around to continue his exit.

Ten minutes later the group of giggling girls passed Harry, who was perched on the bottom step to the street, waiting in the cool air. The tourists of Venice were flocking by without a clue to what lay inside the desolate church building. A toe angled itself into Harry's hip. "Oi, Potter. Look what I've got." Draco waved a piece of parchment at him. Harry merely raised an eyebrow and stood up, brushing the dust off his jeans. Draco had already set off down the street towards the nearest canal, talking loudly. "I've got their hotel and names. I'm such a ladies' man. I think that Jessica really liked me and I think that she's the sort of girl that would agree to an orgy with her -"

"Shut up. Just call for a boat."

Draco waved his hand out over the waters and a gondola pressed lazily against the bank for them to climb into. "If only she had a brother…"

**TBC**

**Author's Note: **Hey guys, sorry about the long wait, had family issues that got in the way of posting. All reviews and speculations on this chapter welcomed, hope you enjoyed it! Next update in a week!


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter Five**

Harry stood in the mental ward, waiting for Draco to open his door. A series of loud scrapes and bangs signalled that the man was looking for his decency in his chest of drawers. As he waited, one of the twin's inventions went scuttling past him. In the dark Harry couldn't see the abomination too clearly but it looked like a Snidget with the legs of a flamingo. It ran like an unstable lamb towards the stairwell and peered down to decide if the risk of snapping one of it's twig-like legs was worth the escape. Apparently so; it gave a valiant chirp and flung itself off the top step, out of Harry's sight.

"That thing was swimming in my bathtub earlier," said Draco, scrubbing his hair sleepily and looking at Harry holding his pillow. "I suppose you are asking for a place to sleep for the night?"

"Yeah." Harry tried not to notice Draco's name embroidered on the hem of his boxers. Draco didn't bother to ask questions, just flung the door open in invitation and made his way back to bed.

"You have to serve me tea in bed at lunchtime," stated Draco, "If I have to sleep in boxers and suffer seam imprints on my testicles, then it's the least you can do."

"Sleep naked for all I care." Harry climbed onto the bed and shoved an elbow into the warm span of Draco's back. Draco wriggled slightly away from the centre of the mattress and laid in the hot air of Venice with the covers bunched up at the bottom of the bed. Harry arranged his pillow to his comfort and then splayed himself out on his back, looking out through the open windows to the veranda's greenery that was obscuring the night sky. They laid in silence for a long time and Harry thought Draco had drifted off to sleep, but the pale figure's question broke the tranquillity of the room.

"What did you do this time to make Flinchy kick you out?"

"Goodnight, Draco."

"Aww, c'mon! Tell me! I'm only curious!...hey, wake up…wake up! I know you're awake; no real person snores like that. Potter?...Potter? TELL ME!"

xxx

Something large collided with the door that jolted Harry into consciousness, and then a loud bang emitted from somewhere down the hallway. It seemed the twins were awake. Harry lifted his head from the curve of Draco's breath-moist neck to scowl at the door before flopping back down into his comfy position.

The knee lodged between his thighs shifted a little but remained a gentle pressure against his balls, the kneecap pressing against the soft flesh behind Harry's scrotum. Harry slid his hand out across the cool sheets, his palm pressed over the ridges of the springs in the mattress until his fingertips met something warm.

Draco opened one eye slowly in the morning light when Harry touched his elbow. He merely looked at Harry blandly before shutting his eye and humming softly. "Tell Kingsley I'm too ill for a mission today. I'll do overtime next week to make up for it."

"That's a lie, Draco. You're just lazy." Harry liked to state the obvious sometimes; it made Draco's brow crinkle in distaste. The knee shifted and pressed slightly to the left, trapping Harry's testicles between their legs.

" 'mm no' lazy!" protested Draco lazily into his pillow. Harry would have gotten out of bed, gone down to the morning meeting and listened to Kingsley prattle on about assignments and comradeship, if it weren't for the fact that Justin could give the cold shoulder with the expertise of an mute Eskimo and Draco's knee was making unperceivable erratic little juts during his nap that was too pleasurable not to take advantage of.

"Somnophilia is frowned upon in most societies, Potter," murmured Draco in his sleep. Harry just closed his eyes and didn't go out of the room to do his heroic duty for the morning shift.

xxx

"That's suicide!" said Harry angrily. "Two people cannot do that job." Draco seemed to find the life threatening situation irrelevant until he had flicked the kettle on and extracted a cup from the cupboard to ensure himself the promise of a hot beverage.

"Well, the only people left are Fred and George," stated Hermione.

Draco gave her the look of doom over his shoulder. Harry wished he had a camera. Draco's classic model pout could have fetched a few in the Muggle world. "A mission with the Weasley twins?...I prefer suicide, frankly."

Harry gave Draco a look. One that said, _You're not being helpful. Just shut up and drink your tea._

Draco, however, returned a look of his own and though Harry knew he should probably have felt scorned, he merely felt the ghost of a pressure between his legs from when Draco accidentally kneed him in the groin forty minutes ago. Harry forgave him because the shock of waking up to someone snuggled against you could be scary sometimes, like non-consenting strangulation, and that could lead to bruises. Justin still had a little yellow bruise under his Adam's apple.

The kettle clicked and announced it had reached boiling point at the same time that Hermione had. She thumped the handle of her wand on top of Harry's head and wagged a finger at his dazed eyes. "If you don't come to meetings, then you are stuck with what you get. You will do the mission, and you will do it tonight. If you need back up, then you can take the twins. Everyone else has already been assigned. If you don't want the twins to help, then you and The Kettle –"

"Hey!"

"- can go there yourselves. Risk your lives for all I care, just get the work done. Kingsley wants all the reports on his desk by tomorrow night." With the law laid down, she spun on her heels and swept out of the room, not bothering to glance at Draco, who was searching for teabags in the toaster.

"This is your fault."

"My fault?" repeated Draco, his voice only containing half the defensiveness it would have done if he were not on a hunt for Tetley.

"You were the one who decided we were not going to Collab this morning. Being all 'ill' and everything."

"Hey, I wasn't stopping you."

Harry would have mentioned the bed's allure of warmth versus the desirability to listen to his superior berate them about standards of work ethics, but he considered that his words would be lost on Draco. Going over to the blonde, Harry opened one of the cupboards on the walls and pulled out a bag of PG Tips. Draco snatched the packet and ambled over to the kettle with glee. "We're partners. That means train together, spy together, kill together, go to boring meetings together, we –"

"Sleep together," added Draco, pouring the water. "I think this morning is an excellent demonstration of the 'togetherness' that Kingsley all expects us to have."

Harry couldn't help but smile. "He wants us to have comradeship, not all become faggots."

"I didn't feel very faggoty this morning. Just sleepy. What about you?" Draco took a sip and closed his eyes with what could only be a noise of an orgasming chimpanzee emitting from his lips. Harry didn't feel like a faggot. "I wonder if Flinchy got a better assignment than us. I bet he has, the lucky bastard."

"He probably turned up for the meeting."

"So? I don't see how turning up to a meeting to listen to that fucking tea-stealing maniac ramble on about pansy bollocks has to do with getting better…oh."

Harry turned away from making his own cup of tea to see Draco pulling a piece of folded parchment out of his pocket. He felt his insides turn to liquid. He spun around and turned off the kettle, putting the handmade '_I saved the world and all I got was this stupid scar_' cup away. "Come on, lets go find the twins. See if they'll do backup."

Harry saw Draco slip the parchment back into his front left pocket of his black jeans, the hem of his light blue dress shirt settling back over the opening of the pocket. "I still vote suicide. Or a Pact. Do you think that would be enough comradeship for Kingsley's taste?"

xxx

"I don't know…" mused Fred, leaning against the doorframe, pet experiment settled against his chest and squeaking out a high pitched purr of enjoyment as the freckled man stroked it lovingly. It was almost pornographic. "Sounds a bit dangerous."

"I don't mind sticking my neck out for you, Harry, mate." George smiled and reached over to pet the creature in his brother's arms. He sent a look over Harry's shoulder. "But getting it lopped off for a Malfoy…"

"Draco will behave. We want your help. Please."

"I chose suicide," inserted Draco, smiling and nodded blandly at his fellow Mental Ward inhabitants.

"Okay…_I_ need your help," amended Harry. "To stop him from getting me killed." Both twins looked sympathetically at Harry at the same time Draco commented on how unsightly their freckles were. Harry tried to smother Draco's words with his hand but it was too late.

"You're on your own, mate." The door slammed shut in Harry's face. Draco continued to smile pleasantly, prying Harry's hand off his lips. Harry wiped the saliva off on his jeans.

"I need to change. I don't want to die in anything less than cashmere." Draco made towards his own bedroom, casting a look over at his shoulder at Harry's hyperventilating form with a questioning look. "I live in hope, but…you're not going on a mission dressed like _that_, are you?"

Harry looked down at his light blue jeans that he had borrowed from Ron at the end of seventh year and never returned, and the orange polo shirt Dudley had gotten when he was four. "What's wrong with this? It fits."

Draco's room was cool because of the sheltered green light streaming in through the French doors and loud twittering was coming from the balcony. Draco's back was shaded green as he dropped his shirt to the floor and began unbuttoning his flies. "Close the door. I'm not having the other patients peeking at me."

Harry moved from the threshold and closed the door behind him. Draco's trousers hit the floor with a loud echoing thud before he moved to the bathroom. Harry cautiously waited until the door was closed and the sound of running water alerted him to Draco's occupancy. Scrambling for the discarded jeans, Harry rummaged through each pocket and finally withdrew a piece of parchment from the front left.

Unfolding it, Harry scowled at the loopy writing. _Jessica Whitehorn,_ _l'albergo, Castello – Edwin_

_Who the fuck calls their owl Edwin?! Silly name. Silly girl. _The door to the bathroom opened and Harry hastily moved away, shoving the parchment into his own pocket discretely. Draco's nipples were erect through the pale pink cashmere sweater and the leather trousers were going to induce a stroke in anyone they happened to encounter on their way out.

"Do I look okay?"

"Fine," grunted Harry, hand pushing the paper deeper into his pocket.

Draco smirked evilly and made towards Harry's trouser button. "Your turn."

xxx

Leather made Harry itch. He felt that it was inappropriate to scratch his crotch at this delicate moment in time, but nudging Draco in the ribs more than made up for the fact he was now dressed like a dominatrix slut. "I'm thirsty."

"Don't start with that!" growled Harry. The only advantage that Harry could really suss about wearing half a dead cow was that it was more waterproof than denim. A particular _squelch_ indicated to the suction being released by the ground around the atrocious bulge in his trousers as he shifted a little in the thick sludge. Draco sent a sideways glance at Harry and, with a very boyish smile, shifted his own weight to create a similar 'sssllllllluuurop!' noise around his navel area.

The twins were not impressed. Both Harry and Draco received swift kicks to their shins that left them smirking secretly at one another while they laid in the muddy foreyard to a church. The church laid over a small clearing of buildings, two bridges branching over water were on opposite sides of the square, and there was nothing but the back of waterlogged houses for scenery.

The low wall surrounding the 'garden' of the church enabled them enough coverage to remain illusive in dark lighting. Unfortunately, it was not tall enough to crouch behind, so they had all resorted to lying on their stomachs on the grass-barren soil while thick clouds rained heavily down upon them. Harry thought he would catch hypothermia.

"Argh! Get your elbow out of my side, you twit!" Harry knew Draco tended to be more grouchy when his hair was hanging in stingy brown tendrils over his eyes. Apparently, Fred didn't know this. "Don't touch any part of me with your awful diseased skin. I could contract freckles and be doomed to a life of sexual strife like you!"

"Freckles are not contagious. And lower your voice. We don't want to get spotted," reprimanded Fred.

"They bloody well are. And don't be so uptight; they're not even here yet." Draco made to straighten himself above ground level, but was promptly dragged down by the twins. Draco complained more about his soon-to-be freckly death as he settled himself comfortably back into the mud. Harry felt it was best not to point out that Draco had a smattering of freckles across the bridge of his nose already. Neither twins were inclined to mention it either, probably knowing that the success of hiding depended on Draco's level of indignation.

After twenty minutes of monologue blonde bitching, Draco was promptly silenced with a swish of George's wand when six or seven shadowed figures appeared with an orchestra of 'pop's on one of the bridges. They all marched into the square and huddled in a group like cold penguins while one of them cast a boundary line for privacy. Harry felt the spell settle over his top half, and wondered if Draco would have commented on his bum's exclusion from the conversation if he had the ability to talk. He merely huffed and made another squelching noise from his trousers that earned him another sore rib.

"Is it up?"

"Yes, but before the others get here…" One of the figures pulled out something from his pocket, and it glinted dully in the moonlight. Highly polished dank wood passed hands and the one receiving it made a noise of impressive agreement.

"Thank you."

"Treat it like your own. They're hard to get hold of, especially with the Aurors here."

"I'll treat it like one of my own children," insisted the receiver.

The other man snorted. "Well, in that case, I'd like it back. How is your boy's leg fixing up? Is he out of Mungos yet?"

"His mother worries too much." The wand was pocketed. The group stood in relative silence for a while, their shoulders occasionally knocking against one another. "When are they going to get here?"

"Be patient."

Draco had resorted to resting his forehead against the wall, sheer boredom making him collapse in a fit of pique. His left hand was swirling patterns in the mud between him and Harry's side. It took a moment for Harry to realise Draco's finger was leaving a trail of letters in the sludge. _Bored?_

Checking the coast, Harry moved to free his hand and sketched a reply. _Very. Behave._

_I always behave._ After a minute or so in which one of the Death Eaters had lit up a cigarette, Draco wrote another message. Harry waited for the whole thing to be written before casting his eyes down to the ground to read it. What was written was hardly insightful. _There's mud in my hair! If it seeps into my scalp, I could die. I've heard that Muggles can die from liquids on the brain._

_You're not going to die._

_Would you miss me if I did?_

Harry felt it was time to concentrate and Draco's face was too distracting. _You have freckles on your nose._ Draco's silent treatment was a lot more effective than usual because of his inability to chirp.

xxx

They had waited an hour and Harry wondered if his genitals had retracted from the damp cold. Leather was not waterproof. He had won eleven games of noughts and crosses and now Draco was scrawling bad poetry into the floor. _Your bloody face, your jaded eyes, you manly bits, my lack of surprise. When I saw you in that shop, I know what I wanted you to dro -_

Loud pops splitting the tranquillity of the square made everyone jump. Four hooded figures moved towards the privacy spell, the smallest one leading the way with an authoritive stride.

"Why did you call us here early if you were going to be this late?"

The insolent talker was silenced by the midget leader with a flick of their wand and Draco, fellow mute, was sympathetic. One of the robed figures shifted their weight, shoulder bumping into its neighbour's. Midget-leader caught the motion and with a flick of the wrist the shifty fellow was knocked out cold.

"I don't think that my lateness should really be an issue; there are aurors swarming all over the place." The voice was high and among the testosterone, sounded squeaky and too effeminate to command an army of boisterous Death Eaters.

_Squeaky pouf_, scrawled Draco, dirt ruining his suspiciously perfect manicure. Harry rolled his eyes.

_You speak like him._

_I do not!_

_Do. Shut up and pay attention._ Harry gave Draco one firm nudge to refocus him to the scene before them.

" – This is serious!" snapped the small leader, voice almost lost across the way. "We've still got another twenty shipments to do this month and getting them past the Aurors is getting harder and harder. I'd hate to have to change our operations just because you lot are too fucking stupid to keep a low profile!"

"We are keeping a low profile!" whined one of the Death Eaters, tugging at his hood with a brattish manner, making sure that his features would be obscured not only from any inhabiting onlookers, but from the chilly glare of the midget-leader.

"Really?! Is that why I had to provide McNair with a new fucking wand?! Is that why half the Bridge of Size is now in the fucking canal?!" The voice emanating from under the small hooded figure was becoming more infuriated with every second passing. A hand appeared from under the long sleeve, banishing a finger at the rest of the circle like a disgruntled mother. "There were Aurors around the containment area earlier this week! You're supposed to be keeping them off the fucking trail, not letting them follow you into the fucking holding house!"

"We're sorry! They've been getting wise to us, we cant help it!"

"You can fucking try. One more cock-up like McNair and I'm going to tell your Dark Lord where he can shove his precious wands! You can find yourself another dealer!" The group drew in a deep gasp of surprise at the outlandish insolence but the falsetto leader merely took a small breath after the long rant and folded the long sleeves over the slim chest. "That being said, how many more do you need?"

After a long silence, someone volunteered the order quietly. "Another thirty, if possible."

"Fine. Tell your lord that they should be in England in a fortnight's time, at the latest. Good evening, gentlemen." A whirl of robes and the vertically-challenged leader strode out of the privacy bubbles with the entourage of bodyguards and Disapparated. The Death Eaters all stood in silence for a moment before elbowing one another.

"Ball-busting, or what?"

"I'll say. C'mon, help me lift Charles." They scooped down to help the unconscious co-worker out of the mud. Draco was currently poking one of the twins to get his voice back and Harry felt his stomach drop when one of the Death Eaters bent down to pick up his comrade and looked out of the corner of his eye at the movement.

"Time to go!" whispered Harry just as the Death Eater nudged its neighbour and pointed into the church courtyard.

Grabbing hold of Draco, who was making panicking motions to his voice box and wand, Harry hauled both of them onto all fours and crawled them backwards out of the privacy bubble. Wind wailed louder outside the spell and rain drenched down upon them like buckets of ash. Harry pulled Draco close tand grabbled the hem of the other man's shirt until he could place his palm down on lily-pale skin. They were gone before the flash of green met their vacant spot.

xxx

Hermione threw her book to the ground, a gesture not to be taken lightly considering the edition and rarity of the tome, and ran out of the kitchen to the atrociously loud banging coming from the front door. The knuckles rapping against the door became more urgent with every second and when she finally threw the door back on it's hinges, four men fell through the threshold at her feet.

"Ge' off me, you stupid blonde berk!"

"…"

"Christ, move your foot, Malfoy!"

"…!"

"Hermione, close the door!" cried Harry, untangling himself from the inmates of the third floor. She merely stood there, agape, and Harry closed the door for her, safely containing everyone within the property's Fidelius Charm.

The twins both struggled to free themselves from the heap on the floor and Hermione watched as Malfoy made silent fish impressions as he too tried to extract himself from the freckly body parts. Harry was nervously pressing Locking Charms on the inside of the door, his wand waving in jerky movements when Draco tapped him on the back and made gestures to his throat.

"Not now, ask Fred to do it!"

Hermione found Draco Malfoy clutching at the twin's shirts, looking between the two imploringly and tapping his Adam's apple, a somewhat unusual sight. "What's going on?"

"Death Eaters. They saw us -" began Harry, casting the last Charm and placing his wand back up his sleeve.

" - Not 'us'," said Fred, sneering and pushing the silent blonde off his crinkled shirt. "They saw this stupid fuckwit's hair. When are you going to stop dying it, Malfoy?"

"…!!"

"Fred, take the spell off, please!" cried Hermione, trying to contain Draco's arms as they flailed violently at the nearest Weasley in range. Ten minutes of fighting in which Fred refused to reverse Draco's muteness, George made dumb blonde jokes, and Harry looked through the boarded up windows, Hermione had had enough and stormed off with the intention of seeking a superior to deal with the rowdy Aurors.

"IF I DYED MY HAIR, THEN MY EYEBROWS WOULD BE A DIFFERENT COLOUR, WOULDN'T THEY? YOU IGNORANT -"

"I think you tint them," said George, fingering his wand threateningly. "What shade is that? Mrs Milly's Number forty two; neon yellow?"

"DIE!"

"Draco! No! Down boy, down!"

xxx

"First you assault Agent Ruskin and now you've put both Agents Weasley and Weasley in critical condition -"

"I hardly call a crushed sternum and a few bruises 'critical condition'. There's no need to put me in bloody ther -"

Harry thought Hermione was going to pop the little vein in her forehead if her blood pressure continued to rise, because by the way that she was clutching her wand hard enough to make the grain splinter, he expected her to keel over from a heart attack any moment.

"THEN WHY HAS FRED GOT A ZIPPER FOR LIPS?!" she screeched, all attempts at professionalism clearly thrown out the window.

"He Silenced me first. I felt it only fair to -"

"Finish that sentence," Hermione brandished her wand under the fair chin, pressing a little red whelp from the little sparks heating up the tip of the tool from her anger. "You will wish you'd never seen the light of day if you continue to back chat me."

"I'm not back chatting. You'll know what it feels like when I back chat, you stupid -"

Harry thought it was time to intervene; Draco had already reached for the kettle to induce spout-like dents into Hermione's head. Placing a restraining hand on Draco's shoulder, Harry smiled lightly. "We've all had a stressful day. How about you go upstairs and I'll bring you a cup of tea. Biscuits on the balcony sound good?"

Draco silently handed back the kettle and pressed his shoulder into Harry's hand before leaving the room.

"You're still doing counselling!" yelled Hermione after the retreating form, clutching Kingsley's memo tightly as if it was her lifeline. Harry thought she looked stressed when she turned her insomniac-bruised eyes to meet his.

"Tea?"

* * *

**Author's Note: **Sorry about the delay, I blame my beta. Double chapter update. All reviews welcomed.


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter Six**

Harry had already knocked several times and yet there had been no answer. "Draco? Are you actually in there?"

"…no."

"You've got to come out. Hermione told me to come get you."

"There's an incentive if ever I heard one."

"Come on, your session is in five minutes." Harry yanked at the handle and rattled the door in it's frame; a tactic that was ultimately futile in spooking Draco out of his bed. "There's tea out there…"

"Lie not, Potter. I snuck downstairs last night and _stole_ the kettle. It's sitting here, on your pillow." Harry heard the noise of a hand patting plastic and metal lovingly, and groaned.

"I hope you emptied that kettle before you took it to bed. I refuse to sleep on a wet pillow."

There was a small giggle that drifted from under the door. "Aren't you used to sleep in the wet spot, yet? How is Flinchy by the way?"

Wondering what noise Draco's neck would make if he fell down the stairs, Harry continued to pound on the wood till his knuckles turned raw.

"Wotcher, Harry." Looking over his shoulder, Harry frowned with concern at Tonk's angry red hair. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah, Fine." She blinked. "I just had a therapy session. The bitch brought up my mother."

"Ooh, that bad?" Harry gave her a sympathetic pat on her shoulder. "Draco's got his in ten minutes."

"C'mon, cus, get out of bed. Now. It's mandatory for everyone," bellowed Tonks, smacking the door as she went past and moving towards her room. "It's a female one, if you must know."

"I'm up!"

xxx

"I have a question," stated Draco.

"That's nice," replied Harry dully, taking a sip of his tea and wondering if he was ever going to tire of the drink.

"Yeah. I do. And I'm going to ask it."

"I'm on the edge of my seat."

"You're standing."

"Metaphorically, I'm sitting. Ask the question."

"Okay." Draco cast his eyes to the wood grain, and then bravely reached out and knocked on the grain. He straightened the collar of his shirt to little effect because he had left the buttons open to his navel, showing a dull metal heirloom hanging on a metal chain. "Do you prefer to have your cauldron stirred or be the one doing all the wand-work?"

Harry didn't manage to answer the question. Not merely because he had no clue what the metaphor meant, despite his seated emblematic status, but because the door had opened and revealed a very familiar face.

"Jessica!" Draco took a step towards her, hips sauntering in a come-hither sort of signal that made Harry want to avert his eyes. _Think of the children!_

"Hmm. So you're my four o' clock. You're late," snapped Jessica. "Late is better than never, I suppose." Her tone was frosty and her small stature screamed hostility as she flicked a strand of dark hair away from her brown eyes. "Speaking of never - How come you never owl'd me?"

"Aww, I would have," insisted Draco. "I lost the parchment you wrote on."

"As if." Jessica stepped aside and gestured for Draco to move into the room. "Sit on the couch. I think the first issue we have to deal with is what you think a promise is." Draco moved past Harry, entering the other room with a quick wink over his shoulder and a whispered 'feisty' under his breath. Jessica turned to Harry, her darkened eyes moving over the tea in his hand to the scar on his head, judging him in one glare. It seemed she did not approve. "See you on Wednesday, Mister Potter. I hope you endeavour to be on time, unlike your friend. Good day to you."

Harry just took another sip of his tea and gave her a butter-wouldn't-smear-my-crystal-ball smirk. "Good evening." She slammed the door in his face.

xxx

"Where's Malfoy?" asked Justin moodily.

"You could have knocked first." Harry continued reading his book. "And what a lovely greeting. So very appropriate for making up after three days of the silent treatment."

"Well the cold shoulder wouldn't have lasted so long if every time I saw you, there wasn't this blonde stain on your shirt."

"Read the door. The sign clearly states for you to take off your shoes and snide attitudes at the door." Harry turned the page in his book. It was titled '_When You Know Your Wand is Crooked'_, written by an elderly gentleman and co-authored by his lover. Harry hoped that one day he would write a book. He found the probability of this doubtful because the chances that he'd ever find a cooperative lover was very unlikely.

Justin's eyes scanned over the cover, taking in the dubious title and said whilst walking over the threshold, "I think that the answer to that question became apparent about eight months ago."

"When I asked you out, I mistook you for a girl."

"Charming." Justin settled himself on the bed and snatched the tome out of Harry's hand. He flicked through the pages backwards with flippant ennui, finally coming to the inside of the front cover. Harry remained silent; speaking would be futile.

Justin threw the literature away from him. It landed on the floor, pages pressed downwards and neat calligraphic scrawl proudly proclaiming '_Property of Draco Lucius Malfoy, the world's best lover'_ to the floorboards. Justin took a deep calming breath while Harry pondered if Draco would take his book back with the spine bent.

"I want to ask you something, Harry. And just…be truthful."

"Okay."

Justin plucked at the duvet covers, his head bowed, and Harry wished he would grow his hair out instead of getting a number three every couple of weeks. It would be nice to have something to hold on to when things got rough.

"Are you going to break up with me?"

Harry blinked. Then got angry. "Why the hell do you think we'd break up?!" He narrowed his eyes. "Have you been doing drugs?"

"What? No!" Justin crossed his arms and huffed. "You've been hanging out with Malfoy nonstop, what am I supposed to think?"

"I've been on a mission. He's my partner, we're supposed to hang out. I'm not going to put my life at risk just because you hate him for some reason."

Justin's mouth fell open unattractively. Fly catcher. "'For some reason'? You fucking want him! I know about your stupid crush; I'm not blind."

Harry choked and he wasn't even drinking tea. "Crush? I don't have a - a crush on Draco!"

"Pfft!"

"Don't make that noise! You actually think I fancy Draco?" Harry was deeply confused, and frankly, disturbed.

Suddenly a picture entered into his mind. Draco, naked and sprawled out upon his bed, white sheets blending in perfectly with his complexion while Venetian sun streamed through the Venetian blinds, casting bars of light of the stretched torso and lean, muscular legs. Blue eyes staring towards Harry with the same look usually reserved to a cup of tea after a long night working, and blonde hair fanned delicately as if his head was being forcedly held underwater. A male Ophelia.

The pit of Harry's stomach churned and he hoped it was disgust.

"You are obsessed with him."

"You're delusional."

"You're in denial. Either that or you're dense."

"No, I'm not."

"Not what?"

"Dense. Or in denial."

"So you admit you do have a crush on Malfoy?" Justin had a funny sort of expression on his face. Half smug for outwitting Harry and half desolate in anticipation for Harry to admit their break-up.

"Stop saying crush! And I don't fancy him!"

"Are you sure?"

"What sort of question is that?!" cried Harry. He felt words were getting nowhere and reached out to pull Justin across the void. It wasn't too difficult, the blonde's muscles seemed to have slumped into relief despite the reserved weariness in his eyes.

xxx

"Stop smiling."

"I'm not smiling," replied Draco. His teeth had stopped showing but Harry could still see the corners of his lips tilted upwards in the reflection of the tap as Draco filled up the kettle. "Besides, even if I was smiling, I've got the right to. It's going to be fantastic having her here. Might get a regular shag now."

"You've had sex with her?" yelled Harry. He coughed and lowered his voice. "You slut. You've only had one session with her."

"No, we haven't had sex. She spent the whole time ragging on me for not owl'ing her and talking about my deep seated problems when I was a child. I cant wait till next week when I show her my deep seated problems from puberty." Draco's eyebrows invited themselves to a suggestive rendezvous with his hairline.

"I don't like her," stated Harry darkly.

"Why don't you like my girlfriend?"

"She's not your girlfriend!"

"She could be. Why would you dislike my girlfriend? You're my friend, you're supposed to approve of anyone I want to do the dirty with if it means I'm getting some. God Potter, don't you know how to act like a straight, supportive friend?"

"A straight, supportive friend would like any girl you chose to have sex with?"

"Yes. He would be happy that I'm getting some. And his name would be Pedro!"

"Pedro?" Harry smirked. "You've thought about this before, haven't you?"

"No." Draco poured the milk into the teacup. "But his favourite colour is blonde."

xxx

"You don't like me, do you?" It wasn't a question, merely the truth expelled into the air between her comfortable position in the wing backed chair and Harry's slightly itchy one on the rough stripy couch.

"What makes you say that, Mrs Whithorn?" Why didn't she have a leather couch like the shrinks he had seen in the movie's aunt petunia used to watch?

"I saw you giving me the jealous-eye when Draco was coming for his appointment the other day, Mister Potter."

"It wasn't a jealous eye. Don't get your eyes mixed up. It was the I-hate-you-eye."

"Perhaps you may try that look without drifting your gaze down to Draco's arse next time. just a suggestion." She smiled and got out her notepad. Somewhere smaller than an A4 but not an A5 notepad was tilted in her lap to obscure his view of her handwriting. The lines were close together and her writing must be have been minuscule, but the large circular motions the tip of her quill was making indicated otherwise. Slinging one arm behind his head, he posed like Rose and hope that the portrait would be worth a small fortune when it was recovered from the sea. "Let us skip past your unhealthy childhood in which time you were closeted, literally and metaphorically, and skip right to your passive aggressive lust for anything in a green uniforms in your teen years."

"Draco is only my partner. I have a boyfriend. I'm happy and don't fancy my co-workers."

Jessica smiled. Harry wasn't comforted in the least. "Oh yes. Your boyfriend. I've already had a lovely little chat with Mr Flinch-Fetchley two days ago."

"On Monday?" _Damn. That was before the make-up sex._

"Oh yes. He was quite enlightening about Draco's role in your relationship. Said something about a 'crush'." Harry was starting to hate that word.

"I don't fancy Malfoy!"

"Oh, you call him by his surname, do you? Interesting…" She scribbled something down on her notepad. "Tell me, Mister Potter, do you like S&M games? Have you ever had sexual desires about a person of authority? Ever had phrases such as 'master' and 'sir' as key features of a wet dream?"

Harry was speechless. She merely blinked, then waited for his answer. Pen poised.

xxx

While Draco's balcony got sun exposure almost all day, the course of the sun silhouetting the leaves from the east to the west until night came was what Harry enjoyed so much about Draco's bedroom. Not the company. However, Hermione's room only had western exposure and sunset was the rare time of day that she fled from the library and retreated to her room, opening her window to watch the day merge into night. The room was painted in vibrant oranges and Harry, who was used to watching the sunlight on a balcony, found the enclosed white walls a deterrent to the lovely view outside. He wished Hermione would stop hanging out the window and pay attention to his plight.

"I don't understand why we _all_ have to have therapy!" cried Harry. "Draco's the nut, not me. Why do I have to go see her?"

"Ministry orders," replied Hermione aimlessly, the deep sun reflected in her awed eyes. "London told us that they were sending in a residential psychiatrist and that attendance was mandatory for all personnel."

Ron gave a very unmanly giggle. "Cheer up mate; even Kinglsey has to go to them. I heard she made him spend an hour talking and at the end of it, she called him flat and taught him some anti-depression charms."

Harry leaned against the bedpost and folded his arms, contemplating whether he should buy new shoelaces. His current ones were tatty from dragging on the floor.

"Harry, are you okay?" asked Hermione, lifting his gaze with her concerned tone. "You seem upset."

"I just don't like therapy. They might as well just do Occlumency because some of those questions they ask you are bloody invasive."

"It's therapy, mate," said Ron, "it's suppose to be invasive. Otherwise you'd just talk to your mates about your problems."

"Ron! That's not what therapy is for!"

"Yes, it is."

"No, Ron. Therapy is the professional treatment of emotional or mental disorders -" _Excuse me! Disorders? _"- and with the use of psychomagical techniques help the relief of symptoms and improving behaviour to socially acceptable standards. Talking is the key to therapy because good communication will give insight to problems and the roots of them."

Ron clenched his eyes and said slowly, "What a load of dribble. It's because they're just people who are inherently nosy and get paid for it."

Hermione opened her mouth to reprimand against the slander of Ministry approved therapists but Harry cut her off. "…You know Draco…"

"Yeah. small, white ferret, often found in woodlands with a high tea concentration." Ron smirked.

"…He's my partner, right?"

"Yeah. You poor sod."

"You're supposed to look out for your partner, aren't you?" asked Harry, chewing on the edge of his nail with agitation.

"Harry, what's the matter? Has Malfoy been hurt?" Harry marvelled at how she almost sounded sympathetic.

"No…it's…right, sometimes shrinks read too much in to things. Like your childhood and stuff. Well, that stupid woman said - " Harry gave a little bark of laughter but it didn't fool himself. "- said that I had a…a crush on Draco. She's mad, right?"

Hermione and Ron looked at each other before slowly turning their eyes back to Harry. The silence was deafening.

xxx

Harry flattened himself against the wall as Robert came storming through the corridor, his fists clenched at his sides and teeth gritted in a way that Harry knew who was ahead. Sure enough, as he turned the corner, Harry was greeted with the sight of Draco leaning smugly against the threshold of Jessica's appointed office.

"...Aww, come on, what was his childhood trauma? Something must have made him that much of a drip." Draco winked. "You can tell me. You're my healer, you're suppose to help me."

"How would telling you anything about Agent Ruskin possibly help you?" smiled Jessica. Her notepad was held limply at her side and her knee was peeking through the slit in her skirt as she leaned on one hip.

"Blackmail him to stop stealing my tea. Do you happen to like tea?"

Harry kept himself tucked around the corner but when Jessica nodded, he felt a block of ice slide down into his stomach and splash the contents around unpleasantly. He wanted to run up and stab her with her own quill.

"Perhaps you'd care to have a drink with me sometime?"

Maybe Justin would like to go for a drink. To reinforce the fact that Harry really did forgive him for being a prissy bitch. Maybe he should go find him and ask him.

"Yeah, sure."

"Oh good. Might even show you my Earl Grey if you're nice."

"I can be very nice."

Harry spun quickly on his heel and stormed off. To look for Justin, of course.

**TBC**

**Author's Note:** All reviews greatly appreciated, updates will be every week, either on a Tuesday or Wednesday.


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter Seven**

"Here." Ron passed Harry a small piece of paper over the mustard and said between a mouthful of bacon, "'S'from Hermione. New assignments."

"Why isn't Kingsley giving them out?" asked Harry, opening the note with no interest. Ron's reply was blanked for the content of the letter once the print had been absorbed by Harry's dawn-muddled mind.

Upon opening the memo, Harry proceeded to the third floor of Headquarters to seek out his partner's surprisingly elusive company, which had that breakfast caused the kettle to go into mourning. But obtaining such company was a mission in itself and after reflection of the events that followed, Harry wished he had not gone in search of Draco's presence at all. He could have done the mission alone, surely.

xxx

The twins' experiment had escaped again. It was running around his ankles, doing a little jig with its spindly legs in time with his knocks on the door. Pushing at it with the toe of his foot, Harry tried to shoo it away. "Go on, get going. This isn't Irish folk dancing."

Finally getting fed up, Harry stopped tapping on Draco's door and bent down to scoop up the Frankenstein-bird. He walked it down to the twins' door and knocked, and when Fred opened it, Harry flung the creature into his hand.

"Here." Harry didn't wait for a thank you because he figured Fred would still have problems enunciating with his tongue caught in the zipper of his lips.

Going back to Draco's room, he tugged at the handle. If Draco was too lazy to get out of bed then Harry would just have to drag him out. However, when Harry had managed to barge his way into the room, the bed was decidedly empty and suspiciously presentable. The pillows were pilled up in a decorative arrangement like in Aunt Petunia's Ikea catalogues and the duvet corners neatly folded around the mattress, every wrinkle straightened out in a military like fashion.

Harry had the right to feel suspicious. Draco felt that making the bed was house-elves work, and despite Hermione's best efforts, he refused to see an unmade bed as plebeian. Letting his wand slide down his sleeve and settle into the palm of his hand, the tip of the tool resting against his leg, Harry moved further into the room.

The bathroom was empty and so was the closet, but Harry heard a faint murmur from the balcony. The French doors were slightly ajar and Harry smiled. He straightened his posture and moved swiftly over, grabbing the pearl tipped handles and flinging the glass doors open. "Draco, we have another miss – AAAARGH!"

Draco smiled softly, leaning back in his chair and picking up his teacup nonchalantly. Jessica, however, was looking more than a little peeved to have the kiss interrupted. She settled herself back into her chair and crossed her arms, one eyebrow raised as if waiting for an explanation for his presence.

"You were saying?" asked Draco, calmly eyeing up Jessica over the rim of his cup. Harry had no idea _what_ he was saying. Frankly, he felt too traumatised over witnessing Jessica leaning across the table like a cheap floozy, lips puckered for a kiss with poor, confused Draco.

"Erm…" Harry thought that the green sunlight made Jessica look diseased. He blinked a couple of times, hoping to rid himself of her presence, but each time he opened his eyes, there she sat. Like some preying mantis, with the plastic chair substituting for her normal leaf. _That's my chair, bitch!_ "We've got another mission. I've been sent for you; we have to leave by four."

"Okay." Draco turned his eyes to Harry for the first time and wanly smiled. "I would ask you to join us for a hope-we-don't-die drink, but I was hoping to finish talking to Miss Whitehorn about my tragic failure as a Death Eater."

Harry had never had the urge to slap Draco so much since the time he stumbled into the Ministry after his 'tragic failure as a Death Eater'. The smugness was irritating and the way Jessica continued to sit in _his_ chair made Harry feel highly offended.

"Alright, well just be ready soon. Got to be briefed at four." Harry tried to coordinate his muscles enough to smile, but some sort of facial twitch occurred instead which Harry hoped Draco mistook for a 'good luck, mate' wink.

xxx

The bed frame rocked back and forth, the nuts rattling on the bolts and the head frame nudging at the wall in a repetitive motion that indicated Harry's frustration to his neighbours. The sun had not yet hit evening time and was still somewhat stifling the air with the smell of sex. Harry's palms were sweaty and slipped against the skin under his hands. Digging his nails into the soft flesh for purchase, Harry concentrated on the little patch of moisture peeling at the wallpaper above the headboard.

"Faster, Harry. Please."

_Needy little cunt. _Harry dug his nails deeper and rocked hard enough to send the body beneath him into an undignified sprawl. Justin's face was obscured by the pillow he was chewing, but Harry didn't want to see his features particularly, anyway. Face smothered against the pillowcase and shoulders pressed down on the mattress, each push from Harry made Justin's nipples graze the sheets.

At first Harry thought he had the groin muscles of a stallion to make the bed slam against the wall and result in the door rattling on it's hinges from the opposite side of the room. _Shake the room, baby, yeah!_ Harry's sense of sexual prowess was promptly shattered when Draco's voice soaked through the door.

"Potter, open up! She's gone now. What were you coming to tell me?"

"FUG GOF!" exclaimed Justin just as Harry had lean forward to grab a handful of hair, driving the poor Hufflepuff's head further into the feathers.

"…Are you shagging?" Harry heard the amused hesitation. "Could you at least put a sock on the door or something?"

"Fuck Off, Draco!" Harry gripped at the follicles again.

"Ooh, tetchy. What position are you in? The Badger?" The snigger grated on Harry's ears like his eyeballs were being put through a blender.

"FUCK OFF!"

"All right, all right. I'll go pop the kettle on. See you in five." There was another irritating snigger and Draco didn't really need to add, "Hufflewhores have no stamina," because it was a redundant fact.

xxx

"See you later." Justin pressed an affectionate kiss to Harry's jaw line and rubbed his cheek against the day-old stubble.

"See you later." Draco winked and pressed a kiss to Jessica's cheek, his eyes silently mocking the Hufflepuff over her shoulder. Sweeping the hair off her shoulder, he placed his lips against her neck and the slight flicker of tongue made Harry want to heave.

"Let's go," he ordered.

"Goodbye, Draco." Jessica pressed a small poisonous kiss against the edge of Draco's lip, and Justin looked expectantly at Harry's hard glare.

"Fucking hell, Malfoy. Hurry up. Death Eaters wait for no one."

"Alright, alright." Untangling himself from the diminutive woman, Draco strode over to Harry and slung an arm around his neck, gave a wink to both Justin and Jessica, and then left through the front door and out of the Fidelius field.

As the door closed, Jessica and Justin's eyes met. They looked at each other in silence for a long, almost understanding moment. Justin huffed and turned on his heels. Clearly the woman wasn't doing her job very well; she couldn't even keep her man under control.

xxx

"We'll come back and get some."

"But Potter…!" Draco ran his hands longingly over the glass, peering beadily through the window like a child peering at new in-stock brooms. Harry still had the splinters of his Firebolt.

"We will get it on the way back. You can't be stealthy carrying twenty boxes of tea! Leave it!"

Harry had to forcibly pry Draco's face away from the shop display and drag him through six streets before the blonde would agree to walk in the proper direction. The cobbled streets wound through the high stacked houses and over waterways until they came to the edge of the island's divide. They caught a boat to the other side of the island and Draco spent the time complaining about the substandard conditions of the transport in loud tones. Harry merely sat silently as the boat rocketed across the current and tried not to turn red from the disapproving gazes emanating from the pack of nuns tutting towards his partner.

The Guidecca Canal was the widest stretch of water Harry had had to cross since his stationing on the island, and he had forgotten how prone to seasickness extended travelling made him. When Aunt Petunia wanted to holiday away in France and Mrs Figg had been too sick to care for even her own cats, Harry could remember spending half the time on the Channel Ferry with his head over the stern railing.

"There is slime! Actual slime. Why couldn't we have Apparated? Then I wouldn't be stuck with _mould_ on my leg. Look, Potter. Slime!"

Harry didn't want to look at anything that could be the same colour as the contents of his stomach, and stared pointedly at the tittering nuns rather than Draco's elevated shoe sole.

"The memo said that McNair was spotted catching a boat across here late last night." Harry tried to keep his voice steady, but the bile was rising in his oesophagus. "And someone fitting Dolohov's description was seen at the docks last Monday."

"Dolohov." Draco hummed low in the back of his throat and peered over the edge of the ferry, clearly thinking about dunking his shoes in the water to eradicate the slime. "Did you know he used to offer me complimentary bars of soap if I'd let him watch me use them?"

"Dolohov liked you?" Harry thought he was going to be sick. He blamed the sea, but the thought of Dolohov's crimpled face leering through sudsy bathroom steam was not helping to settle his nausea.

"Well, either he was very generous or he likes to dip his quill in the wrong inkpot, like some who shall remain nameless." Draco wiggled his eyebrows and nudged Harry's shoulder. The nuns all turned their disapproval towards him, shifting further along the deck, hands clasped to the sky for God to protect them from the dirty sodomite.

The boat gave a slight bump as its front butted the wooden dock of Guidecca. The sun shone over the terracotta roofs, the white dome Chiesa del Santissimo Redentore glinted the day into their eyes as they stepped onto the island of the Venetian lagoon.

Draco wanted to stand on the dock and watch the boat go back to the central island. Harry, being a dutiful partner, stood next to him patiently, waiting for the blonde to finish his melodramatic moment of mourning. "There was tea on that island. I know for a fact there isn't a lick of it here," stated Draco solemnly. Harry placed a hand on Draco's shoulder.

"There, there. We'll be back at Headquarters by nightfall."

Draco looked over his shoulder at Harry, hope shining in his eyes. "Really?"

xxx

"You said we'd be finished by nightfall." Draco pointed up to the sky where the moon cast silver linings on the clouds and paled Draco's off-white porcelain complexion even further. Harry wanted to poke him with a stick and see if the road kill would wiggle. "You said we would be back at HQ before nightfall and we're not. I hold you personally responsible." Draco waved a finger in front of Harry's eyes. "All this lunar exposure could cause me to have a lycanthropic fit and when I maul you to death, you'll deserve it."

"…Draco, you don't scare me." Harry turned away and moved into the next street. He heard Draco striding widely to keep up. Apparently inbreeding had left Malfoy bones fragile and left their descendants with the inability to move faster than what could be labelled 'brisk'.

"And why not?" huffed Draco, stepping in time beside Harry. "Man-Who-Lives thinks he's above being attacked? That's so conceited. You know, not everyone is impressed by your celebrity status. Some people are so unimpressed that they want to lop off your head and shove it up your rear-door so that you're no longer a walking metaphor."

"Really?"

"Yes. Really. Is that why you aren't scared? Because I'll have you know, just because I'm your partner and swore before the Minister to protect you doesn't mean I wouldn't give you a Potter-oscopy."

"I'm not afraid because you're not a werewolf."

"I might be."

Harry merely raised an eyebrow. Draco raised his own eyebrow suggestively and pulled down the collar of his shirt to reveal a purpled patch of skin on the slope of his neck. "She purrs like a cat, but could have the bite of a dog."

"…I'd of thought she'd have the tongue of an amputated three-legged lizard, personally." Harry pressed two fingers discretely against the inside of his left wrist, feeling for his pulse. Rage wouldn't cause his heart to explode from his ears, surely.

"Why don't you like her?" asked Draco, straightening his shirt and weaving through the crates left in the back alley. They seemed to have entered the more industrialised side of the island because the rats were lying on their backs, playing dead with great efficiency.

"She's snarky," stated Harry.

"So am I."

"She's arrogant."

"According to your beaver, so am I. Personally, I call it sophisticated charm." Draco flipped his hair out of his eyes in a very flamboyant manner whilst stepping over half a dead cat. Somehow, the action worked well and Harry had to bite his lip to stop the laughter. "I don't know why you don't like her," said Draco, "She's like the female version of me. And I'm perfect."

"You know, they say that opposites attract. Maybe you and her are too similar."

"Too similar?" repeated Draco, stopping in the middle of the alley that ran down the middle of two warehouses. One was made of shiny metal and the other dulled by mortar and dark bricks. The alley was so narrow their shoulders scraped the walls as they strode side by side, but now that Draco had stopped walking, Harry was forced to stand chest to chest with the blonde. The cold air made their nipples extend and touch one another.

"Yeah. Too similar. I bet she was a Slytherin." Harry leaned back against the bricks and crossed one ankle over the other. Calm as a cucumber.

"You just don't like the fact that she's got boobs. You're a misogynist." Draco leaned back against the metallic wall and scratched his chin.

"I don't hate women!" cried Harry. "I've never been prejudiced in my life."

Draco snorted. Harry scowled. "If you weren't prejudiced against women, then you wouldn't mind sticking your wand in their -"

"My preferences don't mean I hate women. I could say the same to you. You hate men because you don't go sticking your -"

"I'll have you know that I -" Whatever Draco was going to say fell short from his lips because his eyes were trained steadily above Harry's head. Tilting his chin up, Harry saw the underside of a window ledge. "Bingo!" breathed Draco. Pushing Harry out of the way, Draco grabbed a crate and placed it under the window.

Harry climbed onto the box with Draco, their legs tangled and knees bashing each other viciously. "Move over."

"Shut up."

"You're taking up all of the box!"

"Shh!"

Through the window was a flurry of activity obscured by the dust plastered to the pane of glass. Black figures moved about, yellow shaped, and loud crashes made the window rattle in its frame but a Silencing Spell must have covered the compound because no sound escaped. Pulling his wand from his pocket, Harry tapped the window and whispered under his breath, "_Evanesco._"

xxx

As soon as the window vanished, Draco wanted to kick Potter. The fool could have triggered surveillance spells or booby-traps. The vacuumed release of stale but somewhat familiar air filled his senses at the same time he sent his foot into his partner's shin. The last time a Muggle had gotten near the front door of the Death Eaters' old headquarters, he had come down for breakfast one day to find a paperboy bleeding on the front step and Nagini suspiciously oblong and choking on the sports section.

"When you get eaten by a snake, don't cry to me for help. You idiot."

"Why would a snake eat me?" asked Harry.

Clearly Potter didn't understand the effectiveness of a snake compared to a guard dog. "Guard dogs stop once you're in pieces. Snakes eat the evidence."

Potter raised one of his eyebrows. Naturally they were as messy as the hair on his head and Draco wanted to attack him with a pair of tweezers.

They both ducked beneath the windowsill as someone walked by their hiding place. After a moment or two where they were both crouched on the crate, Draco felt his balls resting on Potter's femur and his right knee was nestled between a pair of clenching Gryffindor thighs. They waited a moment before straightening up and peering back into the warehouse.

They both watched numerous Death Eaters shuffling around the warehouse, organising cargo into various piles and drinking from tourist novelty mugs. '_I swam the canals and all I got was this stupid cup_' was held up by Carrow. '_I stood on the Rialto Bridge and all I saw was some water' _was sipped by Dolohov, and McNair was clutching a cup that exclaimed in red lettering '_I went to St. Marco's and played polo'."_

Snape held a plain white cup, expressing no slogan to give evidence that he had a personality. They all stood, chattering about something or other, and Potter looked murderously at their old teacher. Draco didn't understand what was so wrong with Snape, the man had been good to him; and made sure that Dolohov never flashed his magic carpet at Draco.

Snape took a sip of his drink, his eyes peering over the rim at the other workers shifting boxes around with the same gaze he would use at Hogwarts when Longbottom was about to add salamander eyes to Veritaserum.

Pushing their heads through the paneless window, Harry and Draco entered the interior of the Silencing Spell.

"For Hera's sake, be more careful, you bloody clot!" growled Snape, pulling out his wand and casting a _Reparo_ on a broken crate that was smattered around the floor next to a fallen Pettigrew.

"How about you stop drinking tea, Severus and move the stuff yourself!" snapped Peter, his blotchy face turning red with embarrassment as he heaved himself off the floor. Draco didn't know what Peter had done in his absence to earn enough disfavour with the Lord to be shipped to Venice, but whatever it was had left the snivelling man at the bottom of the ranks.

Carrow's windy sniggers were easily distinguishable from Pettigrew's yelps of pain as Snape sent a series of Stinging Hexes to the fat oaf's arse-end, and part of Draco wanted to be on the other side of the wall, joining in with the daily rat-torture.

"Talk back to me again and I'll tie your tail to a rock and throw you into the canals. Pick up that crate and take it over to Rookwood. He's the one stacking them up." Snape didn't seem to be impressed with the rate that Pettigrew was recomposing himself and sent another jolt of pain to the man's obscene jiggling behind.

Pettigrew threw himself back on his feet, one hand nursing his backside as he stooped to pick up the repaired box. Small but clearly fragile, the wooden box was cradled against the man's sweaty chest and carried out of sight. Snape rolled his eyes and took another sip, his stare roaming around the perimeter. Potter jumped off the crate in time for Snape not to see the git's scraggily head, but Draco remained peering through the window even though Potter was tugging urgently on his trouser leg. "Get down!" hissed Harry.

xxx

Snape felt his eyes almost drop out of their sockets when he spotted a familiar face in the mid-window of the warehouse. The musty scent of tea filled his nostrils as he inhaled sharply with surprise, his hands clenching around his hot drink. The Malfoy boy's smirk was incorrigible and the wink that accompanied the smile before the blonde head ducked away made him want to laugh at the pure audacity.

"You look like a loon, Severus. What's made you so happy?" asked McNair, turning his head to see where Snape was looking.

_Ah, so that's where you've disappeared to._ Snape shrugged and buried his smile back inside his generic cup.

xxx

**TBC**

All reviews appreciated, I promise to reply to each one this week. Sorry to those who didn't get a reply last week, I was very busy. Speculation on Harry and Draco's relationship greatly welcomed, it's interesting to see how people are reading this. Next update in a week!


	8. Chapter 8

**Chapter Eight**

Whenever he thought of her, he usually thought of brown. Her hair, the fact that she resembled a woodland creature, and her taste in men, all led him to think of the colour brown. So when Draco saw the bright pink Quick Quotes Quill hovering over a piece of paper that was balanced on her knee, he naturally assumed she had gone colour blind or had been spending too much time at the Ministry in the company of that toady woman, Umbridge.

"What colour are my eyes?" he asked with as much concern as one could muster for a beaver.

"Grey," she replied, not looking up from her parchment. _Ah ha! Colour blind! Poor Mudblood._

"So, Harry, where did you say it was?"

Potter had that leach, Flinchy, sitting on his lap, smothering the poor sod with sloppy kisses and Draco wanted to wipe his own neck just from the thought of all that slime. He hated slime. _I know who doesn't have slime-kisses…_ Jessica had asked if he wanted a cup of tea and, in his opinion, there was nothing better in this world than when someone else was making tea for you. It was better than a blowjob. Jessica seemed to agree because the way she was lovingly counting out four sugars was adorable.

"It was in Corte Grande," said Potter, angling his head away from that sappy Hufflepuff as if to bare his throat for more kisses; too much badger-love had clearly turned him into a slut. "Brick warehouse down Calle de Mezzo."

xxx

"It was Calle de Cantier," corrected Draco, smiling sweetly to Hermione. Harry knew it wasn't going to earn him anymore points by being contradictory. Harry could see Jessica pottering about in the background, making tea, trying to sneak her way into Draco's heart through his stomach. _The nerve!_

"You have no idea how much I missed you…" Justin's whisper warmed the inside of his ear and made his eardrum sweat. "I was sitting on your bed, waiting for you to come back. Naked and -"

"How did you get into my bedroom?" hissed Harry, almost pulling a neck muscle as he tried to escape his boyfriend's lips. "I locked that before I left."

"Harry!" Hermione looked agitated. Maybe because he was too caught up with Justin, or because Draco was trying to charm her quill brown. "Tell me what else you saw."

"Oh right. Well, I saw McNair, Snape, Pettigrew, Carrow and Dolohov there, and loads of others I didn't recognise."

"What were they doing there?"

"Drinking coffee," said Draco, scrunching his nose up in distaste.

"Could have been tea." suggested Jessica lightly, smiling as she pulled out a teabag from the cupboard.

Draco gave her a besotted smile but replied, "No, there's no tea over there. Bacino Orseolo is the only district in Venice that sells tea. It's madness!" Harry didn't think that Jessica was all that interested about the facts of tea, her eyes narrowed as if she was falling to sleep with boredom.

The noise of the kettle building up to boil played heavily through the room as Harry described the night's events. "…and basically there were all just drinking tea. Pettigrew was carrying this box though, and Snape said that it had to be filled up."

"Box?" Hermione pulled out her wand almost as a side thought and sent a couple of warning sparks in Draco's direction. Draco patted his blonde locks to make sure they hadn't become alight.

"Yeah. You know the box that your wand goes into…the box Wormtail was carrying looked a little bigger than that…about…twelve by six inches, I reckon."

"I'd say eleven by six," inserted Draco. Hermione sent orange sparks to his fringe.

"Filled up with what?" asked Hermione, frowning in her mind's eye at the box's dimensions.

"Flesh wands probably." Harry shrugged. He was going to continue but a loud crash sounded from over Draco's shoulder. Justin retracted his face from Harry's shoulder at breakneck speed to see where the noise had come from. Harry was just as surprised to see calm, cool, collected, calculateding Jessica on her hands and knees, scrounging on the floor to pick up the broken pieces of china that was once Harry's '_I saved the world and all I got was this stupid scar_' cup. He wanted to cry.

"Don't worry, I'll make you another one," winked Draco, getting up and going over to help her pick up the pieces of Harry's first Christmas present from his partner. As Draco crouched down, Harry saw him shoot a look up her dress before extracting something from inside the half of the cup that remained intact. "Is this what made you jump? I know he's an ugly thing, but he'll do you no harm." Draco pulled out something yellow from inside the wreckage and cupped it in his hands, presenting it to Jessica. The twins' Franken-bird quivered in his palm, spindly legs pulled up into the plush feathers of its breast and chipping off-key with fear. "He's called Flinchy."

"Fuck you!" cried Justin, rearing off Harry's lap too quickly for the ex-Seeker to make a grab for him. Clearly he couldn't stay crouched down for a confrontation, but Draco kept the cute creature nestled to his torso as he faced off against Justin. Harry felt that interfering now would lead to a loss of limb.

"You should be flattered," stated Draco, stroking Flinchy like the cat in the James Bond movies Harry had seen Uncle Vernon watching while dressed in a sweat flop tuxedo.

"Flattered?"

"Yes, it shows I hold you in high opinion. You're both inclined towards the colour yellow and are too stupid for your own good. If you were his size," Draco indicated the shivering bird," you'd try something stupid like jumping into a cup that's about to have boiling water poured into it, too."

"You are such a wanker!" cried Justin.

Draco sent a mocking kiss through the air. "You just want to see me naked again."

Harry knew his eyebrows were in his hairline and everyone's face, including Jessica's, seemed similarly surprised. The hatred between the two residential blondes was like trying to live with a daily hurricane, but this was like throwing a confused cow into the storm.

"As if!" Justin was turning an interesting shade that Harry only saw in the bedroom. "I wouldn't care if you'd suddenly got the Dark Mark re-tattooed onto your arse, I'd never want to see you naked! Ever!"

"You liar." Draco smirked, looking a lot calmer and yet somehow more in control of the situation as he petted the Franken-bird. "Image it now, me joining you and Pothead for a touch of Scrub your Cauldron. You'd love it. I'm blonde."

"You dye it!" And with that, Justin stormed from the room. Harry stood up and sent an apologetic look to Draco as he went after Justin, but Draco was calmly reassuring Jessica that he could prove his authenticity as a natural blonde.

Hermione just blinked and looked at her Quick Quotes Quill that had detailed the whole conversation. She scanned her eyes over the words scripted and said in a calm voice, "Memo to self, tell Customs to be on the look-out for outporting clients carrying boxes." She pulled out her wand and tapped the paper; it disappeared and she knew Kingsley would have some questions when a copy arrived on his desk the next morning, like…_Agent_ _Flinch-Fletchly and Agent Malfoy? Are you sure, Miss Granger? Is it a ménage-a-trois with that Potter boy?_ Hermione snorted.

xxx

"You saw Draco naked?"

Justin pulled the pillow off his face, his hair all static and fluffy. Sort of like the Franken-bird when it got ruffled and self-righteous. Harry thought it would be a bad idea to say that out loud. "Yeah. So?"

"When did it happen?" Harry was trying to keep his straight face, but he supposed he must have looked angry because Justin seemed nervous and shifty.

"Erm…well…when we were still at Hogwarts. When the changing rooms for our team were flooded by a fluster firework down the drainpipe. Had to share the showers with the Slytherins after a match. Gloating bastards." Justin's eyes narrowed and Harry could see the word 'crush' on the tip of his tongue. "Why do you want to know?"

"Err…no reason…erm…insecurities. Does he look better than me naked?"

"I'm having sex with _you_, aren't I?" replied Justin.

_What sort of answer is that? _Harry scowled. "Answer the question."

"You just want me to tell you what he's like naked, don't you?" huffed Justin.

Harry gasped like they did in theatre. "No! 'Course not! I hate my body. Honest."

"I'll see you tomorrow. Goodnight Harry." Justin got out of the bed and went out the door towards his own room. Harry flopped down in the space he vacated and didn't bother to run after him.

xxx

Breakfast the next day was a rather tense affair because whilst Hermione lectured everyone about the latest reports from the home front of England, the rest of them were glaring at each other over their bacon and beans. Justin and Draco were in a battle of wills over who could eat the slowest and hold eye contact the longest, whilst Ron was stole a glance at Draco before looking vaguely ill. Jessica was pretending to write up notes on her last session with Kingsley, but spent most of the time glaring at Justin and Harry for trying to steal her man. Harry glared at Draco because he didn't want to be left out of the atmosphere, and used the guise of Draco flaunting his bits to his boyfriend as a rational reason to join in. Had Draco always had that little white scar under his eyebrow?

"…And the Dark Mark was found all about Surrey and Guildford, we think that they are attempting to find the hidden Muggle family called the Dursleys…" Everyone but Draco, Ron and Hermione sent him a look of understanding pity and Robert even saw fit to pat him on the shoulder in a comforting manner.

Harry always imaged Dudley would squeal like a pig under the Cruciatus Curse and he had been half-tempted to tell Voldemort where the sods were hidden.

Draco leaned over, his breath pressing down Harry's hair to his scalp and tickled around the shell of his ear, "Times like these test you as a person. You should have made someone else the Secret Keeper. I bet your horse-faced aunt would look good in green light."

"Don't be foul."

"I know you're thinking it."

"I was not," said Harry. And he hadn't been. Dudley's pain was a lot more entertaining.

"Lie not to me, Potter. I know all your thoughts; I'm a mind reading genius," exclaimed Draco in a whisper.

"What am I thinking now?" _Nipples. Your nipples. Poking through your shirt. Why are they always erect? _

Draco took a moment to run his eyes over Harry's face, crunched up his nose and wiggled his mouth from side to side before finally announcing, "You're thinking about my shirt."

"True."

Draco's face broke reformed into a smile. "See, I'm amazing."

Harry was about to contradict this, but Hermione interrupted and therefore Draco's illusions of grandeur continued. "WILL YOU TWO PAY ATTENTION? Honestly Harry, I thought you would be more concerned considering your relatives are involved."

Everyone studiously avoided eye contact between the two Gryffindors. Hermione's hair seemed to increase in volume the more tempered she became and at the moment the sheer frizziness was telling Harry that pointing out the Dursleys' swine-like qualities of DNA were detrimental to his health. He kept his mouth shut and merely crossed his arms over his chest.

They continued to stare, neither giving up.

Draco coughed. Hermione's hair deflated as she exhaled in exasperation and continued the meeting. "Both Portkey Customs have been told to be on the lookout for the boxes and treat anyone discovered with them as Death Eaters." She looked to Robert who was contorted into the basin of the sink, his normal perch on the breadbin taken by a very silent Ron. "Can you take your team to St Marco to patrol incoming tourists? We've got to find out if these boxes are being brought in here or if they are being made on site. I'll assign Tonks to your team, she can blend in and get closer than uniformed agents…"

Draco began twitching in his chair and Harry wouldn't have been so distracted if Justin wasn't also twitching at his side. Caught between two men having coded fitting conversations, Harry could hardly concentrate on Hermione's litigious tones.

Harry watched out of the corner of his eye as Draco wiggled one eyebrow and rotated his wrist. Justin in return twitched in his seat and his middle finger flexed into full extension. Draco's eyebrows gave another wiggle and Harry wondered if Draco's forehead muscles ever got tired. Did it cause headaches?

"…and Agent Potter, Agent Malfoy." They both looked at her, smiling attentively. "I want you to go back to the warehouse and find out what the hell are in those boxes! See if you can get your hands on one and bring it back here. Another win like McNair's wand and we should be able to actually apprehend someone!" Hermione glared around, dolling out the guilt to all her employees. "Meeting adjourned!"

"Can I talk to you?" hissed Justin.

Harry would have replied yes but once again his words were cut off when Draco scoffed. "Certainly, Flinchy. Shall we go to my office?"

Justin was grumbling about snakes and while Draco strolled off, mentioned something about the correct attire for skulking missions.

"Why do you want to talk to him?" asked Harry. He wished he hadn't asked because Justin turned his gaze upon him and raised on eyebrow.

"It's private."

"Oh." Harry wanted to either flee from his boyfriend's tangible disapproval at not respecting his personal life, and at the same time, continue to nose about. After all, from what he had gathered, two blondes should never have converse with each other for setting off high levels of brightness in one place. Harry was saved from his curiosity when Hermione called across to him, "Harry, can I have a word with you? In my office?"

Harry knew that unlike Draco's, Hermione's office didn't have a bed in it.

xxx

Hermione's desk was made of oak. He knew she would prefer a mahogany one. With a little green parliament lamp and a leather inset that would stop her quill scratching through the billions of stacks of handwritten reports lining her work area, and complete the aura of academia.

"Harry." She rarely called him Harry now. A level of professionalism had overtaken her brain and he reckoned that Ron didn't help matters by encouraging her to scream _'Agent Weasley'_ in bed.

"Yes?"

She sighed and sat down in her vinyl chair, caressing the edge as if hoping it would Transfigure into leather, and gestured for him to sit down in the visitor's chair. The chair was wooden and Harry didn't fancy the splinters. "I'd prefer to stand." Hermione took this for hostility, apparently.

"Without more information on these boxes, you and Agent Malfoy are not producing enough results. You have made no arrests in the last three months, you have not recovered any evidence in a manner suitable for analysis…exempting McNair's wand, and since Malfoy joined, your death count is the second highest in the sector!" She shook her head and took a deep breath. "Look Harry. You're supposed to kill as a last resort. Arresting Death Eaters is our job. Kingsley reviewed your file a couple of days ago and is thinking of taking away your licence to kill."

Harry tried not to hum the theme tune to James Bond. Hermione waited for his apology, waited for him to make pledges in the name of Ministry procedure and conduct, but in the end the silence became heavy and so did her sighs.

"Just…go. Go get some evidence and I will try and convince Kingsley not to send you back to England on a desk job."

"He can't put me on a desk job. I'm the only one who can kill Voldemort."

She almost left claw marks in the desk. "Yes, Harry, he can! For god sakes, wake up and smell the formaldehyde! Any more unnecessary deaths and the Ministry will have to declare the war before the public. Kingsley will make you a quill-pusher before you can say 'Avada Kedavra' and only let you from behind a desk again when Voldemort is arrested and in custody."

"Voldemort in custody?" Harry knew snorting was very unladylike and was thankful he had a penis.

Hermione shrugged. "You never know…" She gave a little snort to the idea after a moment of envisioning Voldemort trying to wriggle out of handcuffs in a morbid Houdini act. Her face dropped again. "You're lucky that you're stationed out here, you could get killed. So I understand that killing them is a safer option than housing them here. But…just be more discrete. Don't let Malfoy spout off about the number of body bags you each managed to fill."

"Alright."

"Alright. Go. I'll sort out Kingsley."

Harry nodded his thanks and walked to the door. "Hermione."

"Yeah?" The shadows under her eyes were concealed well by her make-up.

"Thanks."

"It's okay. Just bring back some evidence."

xxx

The Franken-bird was on the loose again. It had clearly escaped the twins and taken a fancy to Draco because when Harry arrived on the third floor, it stood outside the his partner's door, demanding to be let in with loud chirps and a pining noise that he thought only dogs could produce. He scooped the little critter up, intending on assisting it towards Draco's bathtub when he heard a voice from the other side of the door that made him pause in his entrance.

"I don't like all this time you two are spending together." Justin's voice was clear through the wooden obstruction to Harry's hearing despite the bird singing impatiently in his hands. "Going about the place and all these little tea luncheons."

There was a pause and Harry almost burst in there to request front row seats on the bed.

"He's my partner. And these 'luncheons' are merely to discuss business with the added benefit of tea…I get dehydrated quickly, you know." Harry knew this was a lie. Any moisture that Draco didn't consume through his mouth, he would surely acquire through his vanilla and mango body butter. Applied twice daily.

"Just back off, okay? Partner with someone else or something."

"You're obviously a very insecure person if you feel that I'm a threat. Which is a better colour, the blue one or the red?"

"If you weren't such a shit spy then I'd have no need to worry. You'd be over there, knowing the plans and not drinking fucking tea with my boyfriend!"

"I think the blue one would look better. It would bring out the colour in my eyes and make my chest look stronger, don't you think?"

"Fuck the ties! I wish you'd never come here!"

"Hey, don't make it out to be my fault that I was discovered. I wasn't the one moaning like a cheap whore, loud enough to bring every Death Eater from this side of the English Channel running. If it wasn't for you, I'd still be a spy."

"You shouldn't have been screwing around on the job!"

"Neither should you!" Something thudded loudly and Harry wasn't sure which one of them had lost their temper and begun bodily harm first.

"…Whatever. Just stay away from Harry."

"No. He's my partner; I shall have verbal intercourse with whomever I like." The Franken-bird gave a little squeal, like a deflated balloon as Harry's hands clenched none too gently around its body.

"Stay away from Harry. I mean it."

"Whatever. Just go fetch in that scary canary. I think its dying out there."

Harry felt the panic rise up in him as he heard Justin huff and move across the floorboards.

xxx

**TBC**


	9. Chapter 9

**Chapter Nine**

Harry had thought about dropping the ugly bird to the floor, casting a disillusion charm and blending in with the nearest wall. It was a good plan despite the animal cruelty involved, and Harry would have deployed it if he had time enough to act before the door opened. Justin's lips formed a soft 'o' of astonishment, his eyes darting from Harry's face to the squirming poultry that was still chirping for freedom from Harry's grasp.

Harry's attention was otherwise occupied from the constipated expressions Justin was pulling. Draco stood by the door to the bathroom, pinstriped trousers unbuttoned with the tails of an Oxford shirt stuck in his flies, a blue tie hanging skewiff around his neck. The top three buttons were still not done up and his fringe static from changing.

It was the most unkempt Harry had ever seen Draco after his first cup of tea. Draco looked horribly ruffled overall, and Harry was surprised Draco would permit Justin to see him in such a way.

The opportunity was suspicious and therefore, gold.

"Nice tie."

"Harry!" called Justin, trying to step over the dropped bird and run after his boyfriend.

Draco just smirked, finished tucking his shirt in his trousers and thought, _about bloody time!_

XXX

Seated on the steps of the church, Draco watched a little boy chalking up the pavements of the square with his sister, the parents casting the occasional watchful glance in their direction from the café. He had watched the same two children defiling the stones for the past four months, usually through the veil of foliage his balcony provided him. He loved his balcony, but to sit in the sun…not run for his life, to not worry about a wand trained on his back…for just five minutes, it was nice to bask in the sun and pretend he was there on holiday.

The boy was chalking some sort of Loch Ness monster with a pink crayon, and Draco slipped his wand down the side of his sleeve. He cast a quick _Evanesco_ on the drawing and the boy began to cry abruptly from the shock.

Draco was most gratified when the girl silenced her brother by whacking him over the head with a piece of her yellow chalk. In his head, he named her Pansy.

Draco shivered. The shift of magic nearby was his cue to get off his arse. Tucking his wand safely away, he stood up and, concealed in the arch of the church entrance, dusted his trousers down. When he saw Potter appear out of a dark shadowed corner that none of the Muggles drew their eyes to, Draco took one step into the sun again.

Squinting at Potter, Draco tried to keep his face neutral. "Do you feel any lighter without the ball and chain?"

"Much." said Potter shortly. He seemed surprised at the Muggle attire, or maybe he was stunned by the unknown concept of a suit, the scruffy git. He gave Draco a once over and nodded. "Let's go."

"Right-o."

The little boy threw the yellow chalk back at his sister's eye, but he never got named because Draco and Harry were already atoms in the air.

XXX

_"So let me get this straight," Draco sneered at the wood rot on the skirting boards, "My superior is a know-it-all Mudblood?"_

_Kingsley had a twisted sense of humour it seemed. "Oh yes." _

_"Great." Draco wanted to turn heel and go back to the other camp. Surely Voldemort would let him off just this once. After all, what's a little spying matter anyhow?! Kingsley gestured to the stairs on the right of the corridor and as they ascended them, the chuckle the Auror let out before continuing his informative welcome was less than assuring._

_"Unfortunately, the only room we have available at the moment is on the third floor."_

_"...so? Better than the first floor, surely." Draco hated canals. What was the point of building houses in water? When Kingsley didn't contradict him, Draco wondered if he really would prefer to be at canal-level accommodation._

_"The rest of HQ were briefed about your arrival, and I'm sorry to say that there are only two people not partnered off already. However, Ronald Weasley is our greatest weaponry man and therefore cannot be put at risk in the field, so you're left with one option."_

_"Weasley?" Draco felt himself becoming nauseated_. _"Is this whole place overwrought with Gryffindors?!"_

_They climbed three flights before coming to a chaotic landing that was covered in screws and green gloop. He followed Kingsley across the way, and was led to the only plain door at the end of the corridor. Raising one eyebrow, he shifted his bag and pushed open the door, blinking into the sunlit room to the open French windows to the balcony beyond. "...Wow."_

_Too overcome with exploring his new balcony, becoming intimately acquainted with the vines and shrubbery, Draco completely forgot to ask who was the only other unpartnered Auror in the joint. This was his first mistake_. _When Harry Potter stepped out onto Draco's new veranda, he almost fell over the side of it with shock. _

_Kingsley had a twisted sense of humour because he more than let out a stray chuckle. Sadistic bastard._

XXX

"So…" began Harry, a few paces behind Draco as they weaved through the alleys. "You and Justin, eh?" Malfoy just smirked over his shoulder while Harry tried to avert his eyes and be subtle. "…you never mentioned you were gay."

"I'm not gay."

"Oh, so fucking my boyfriend had -"

"I have never had sex with your boyfriend." stated Draco, turning the corner to the back of the warehouse.

"Justin told me about your 'liaisons'!" hissed Harry, flattening himself against the outer wall of the warehouse.

Draco smirked, "He wasn't your boyfriend at the time."

Harry's teeth clicked loudly as he shut his mouth firmly. "Well…well, you're definitely not 'straight'."

"I am bisexual."

Harry snorted. _What bollocks_. "You either like cock or not."

Malfoy turned around to look at Harry and raised an eyebrow. "I like cock. And I like boobs."

"Then maybe you should go out with a fat man." Harry almost cupped his own chest to show that he had the capacity to fill an A cup, but decided that insanity was only a long stride off a very short pier. And on reflection, he didn't have the capacity to fill an A cup.

"A fat man?" repeated Draco, looking at Harry suspiciously, his nose screwed up, "Are you trying to set me up with your cousin again?"

"You have the same sense of humour." Stated Harry. He would bet his left nut that Draco would never let Dudley touch him. They rounded the side of the warehouse where the window that they had previously peered through came into view. The box that they had stood on was still there and security seemed somewhat lax because the pane had not been returned to it's window frame.

Draco stepped onto the box first and Harry had to elbow him in the ribs to get enough foot space for himself, nudging the blonde over so he could see inside the warehouse. "Move over, you closet!"

Draco made a noise of indignation. "Closet? What is Jessica then? A beard?"

"Yes! You can't use her as an excuse when you've been sticking it to Justin!" hissed Harry, digging another elbow into the warm side, "Besides, you've only kissed her once!"

Jessica had been around for almost a fortnight now, but the more times he saw her in the corridor, or Draco hanging around her like she'd dipped her bra in Earl Gray was making those two weeks stretch like an eternity.

"Three kisses." corrected Draco, smiling somewhat to himself. "She's going to be a firecracker in bed, I can tell."

"From three kisses?"

"And a love bite."

"A love bite." He did remember the red mark Draco had flashed so proudly the last time they were on this part of the island, and the hot nausea that had settled in his stomach.

"…Okay, I got it from Jeff." admitted Draco, a nice flush creeping over his face.

"Oh, do tell!" smirked Harry as he mentally added Jeff to his list.

Draco was looking studiously inside the warehouse for any Death Eaters, and when he decided the coast was clear, scrambled one foot up to the windowsill. "The day Jessica came to have tea with me on the balcony, I had ran out of biscuits and went to get some from the fourth floor kitchen. Jeff caught me on the shoulder with a packet of digestives. That man was a Chaser in his younger days, I'm sure of it."

"You showed me a bruise and pretended it was a love bite?" asked Harry once they had both clambered through the window, dropping down a couple of feet to the dusty floor of the warehouse. The unidentifiable smell that had tickled their senses the last time they had been there was indefinitely stronger on the other side of the privacy spells. Hot and humid, the overhead yellow lighting reminded Harry of a cocaine shed in Cuba. He expected a greasy Cuban to pop out any minute and inspect their nostrils for white rings.

Draco moved through the rows of boxes, heading towards the centre, and Harry followed closely behind, wondering

"It amuses me deeply to see you turn that funny colour you do when you're jealous," informed Draco, letting out a small smirk before turning back to watch Snape. Harry was speechless.

_What do I do, what do I do?! Say I'm jealous? Say that I'm so jealous I want to lick his nipples that are always sodding sticking through his top?! Damn him and his nipples!_

Snape was holding court again on what looked like another coffee break, all the men were slung carelessly over crates, nursing steaming cups. This time however, Snape's cup was not generic, but hand-painted and cracked, the words '_the world' _and '_stupid scar'_ peeking through his slender fingers as he informed Macnair that he was a blundering fool.

"You are a blundering fool." stated Snape, "You have to pack the boxes properly! Do you want to get caught?"

"Why can't you do it?" snarled Macnair as he threw his cup away from him, clearly not enjoying whatever concoction he was drinking. Harry watched as Draco edged forward, towards an open crate that was behind Snape's billowing cloaked form. How his cloak managed to ruffle in a warehouse left Harry to ponder other things than his partner's pert bum which was wiggling in his direction.

"Why bother when you idiots should be able to do a simple task. How are you going to explain to the Dark Lord that you couldn't even fill a few boxes with some t-"

Often full of aristocratic grace and elegance, Draco's nose dive into the crate as he skidded on a dark mass scattered on the floor completely ruined their stealth plan. Snape paused in mid-sentence to blink down at Draco's scrambling form, his legs flailing as he tried to extract himself from the wooden box. The box was upended onto its side and the smaller contents avalanched onto Draco. "Eugh, they stink!" cried Draco, trying to extract himself from the mountain of flesh wands and the box itself. Everyone watched, stunned, and only Harry had the forethought to whip out his wand. Moving from where he was hidden, he approached the circle of Death Eaters. Wand pointed at Snape, Harry grabbed Draco's elbow and extracted him from the crate.

Pink in the face, Draco jerked out of Harry's grip and grabbed his own wand to hold pointed at Macnair. None of the Death Eaters had moved for their own weapons, instead they stared blankly at the two Aurors and clutched their mugs in disbelief.

The moment was extremely anticlimactic.

XXX

Severus was the first to recover, feeling his senses adjust to the sheer idiocy of his apprenticed spy, and pulled out his wand to thrust at Potter's features in return.

"Mister Malfoy. What a delight. To what do we owe the pleasure of your company?" He briefly glanced at the Gryffindor and felt his lip curl but said nothing. They had gotten themselves into this mess, they could get themselves out of it. Out the corner of his eye, he could see Macnair coming back from his astonishment, flesh wand at the ready.

Draco tugged the collar of his suit and straightened his cuffs. Potter merely held his aim taut and stood in bland jeans and a scruffy orange top. His hair and shirt clashed like a Greek vase.

"Evening, Severus. No welcome-back hug?"

"I'm not the hugging type." consoled Snape, "I'm assuming you're here for some sort of official business…?"

Snape watched Potter's eyes drift to the pile of dark organic mass underfoot, and felt almost relieved until the stupid oaf's brow crinkled in confusion. Evidently, Potter couldn't recognise a simple herb, a skill left un-acquired since Hogwarts. If only the other potion-competent person in the room would look down. _Look, you fool!_

"Actually, it's not that official. Let not the suit fool you." said Draco, "We're merely here for a little peek at this year's wand collection."

"You made a mistake coming back here, Malfoy." snarled Macnair dramatically, shooting a red jet out of his wand.

A brief scuffle of spells rained through the warehouse, lighting up the aluminium walls, until all but Snape were incapacitated. Harry settled his aim back on Snape, and allowed Draco and his favourite greasy haired git to continue their conversation.

"He's right," said Snape, inclining his head toward Macnair's petrified form. "Unless you're here to beg our Lord's forgiveness, then you're just asking for trouble."

With his back to the petrified party, Snape waggled his eyebrows and Harry became extremely disturbed. His wand wavered in his hand as he watched his old professor make sexual advances with his forehead muscles, and Draco respond with one of his own patented eyebrow raises.

A secret conversation seemed to commence between the two Slytherins and Draco finally burst into speech, "Right, well…yes. We must be going now. Erm, and…you cannot stop us, you evil Death Eater man! Erm…spell…" Draco pointed his wand at Snape and gave a familiar wiggle with it, but Snape didn't move. Snape's face didn't move into the frozen constipated look that most people got when they were hit with Petrificus Totalus, but remained unmoving. Harry was left to question whether Snape always looked constipated.

Scooping down on the floor, Draco grabbed two flesh wands. Throwing one to Harry and giving Snape an insolent wink, he turned heel. Harry followed, frowning over his shoulder at the stationary Death Eaters. Snape's billowing cloak was the only sign of movement.

XXX

TBC


	10. Chapter 10

**Chapter Ten **

"So let me get this straight," said Draco, taking off his jacket and slinging it over the end of the stair rail, "Gryffindors aren't taught Eyebrow?"

"No." Harry couldn't believe all the Slytherins could hold whole conversations with the filaments above their eyes. "You actually took lessons?"

"Naturally. I can even speak French in Eyebrow." Draco gave a demonstrative wiggle of his right eyebrow and overall, looked like he was developing a facial twitch. "That meant '_Voulez-vous coucher avec moi, ce soir'_."

"Oh…isn't that part of a Muggle song?" asked Harry. He didn't speak French and frankly couldn't remember what Lady Jam or Marmalade or whoever was singing about.

Draco's suggestive smirk fell from his face and he huffed. "Honestly Potter, you've been to France before. Surely you picked up some key phrases. That was the most key one of them all!"

Harry could feel the judgment in Draco's tone and immediately went on the defensive as they moved towards Hermione's office. "Oh, so you know loads of French then? All in Eyebrow?"

"…Well…no," Draco cheeks turned pink again and Harry wanted to slather him in ice cream. "That's the only phrase I know. But it's very handy…when people fucking understand it."

"Let me guess, plucking your eyebrows has left you with a stutter or something, making you completely incoherent?" Harry smirked. It wasn't often he smirked, and it was probably much more irritating when he only did it occasionally. Draco socked him in the shoulder.

"You wanker! My eyebrows have never even been near a pair of tweezers, they are shaped by the Gods. Right, let's face the music." Knocking on Hermione's door, and then entering at her permission, they tracked dirt into her office.

"Did you find anything out?" asked Hermione immediately, looking up from her stack of papers. The bags under her eyes showed that she had pulled an all-nighter, waiting for them to get back. "Did you see the wands?"

"We did better than that." Draco said, laying a flesh wand down on the table. Hermione gave a noise that could only be described as utter relief and leaned back in her chair, releasing a shallow puff of air.

"Well, you two have proven that you're not entirely useless. Congratulations." She smiled at them.

They proceeded to give her their report of the evening, and Harry had to fill Hermione in on the part where Draco had fallen into the crate of wands, because the blond wanted to omit that event to save his reputation of 'regal grace'. Hermione seemed more concerned with the fact that they had been seen by the Death Eaters and therefore could no longer remain aloof as to their presence on the island.

"What did Snape say?" asked Hermione, completely ignoring the oddness that was Eyebrow.

"I don't know. He was cryptic." Draco rubbed the tips of his fingers along the edge of his lips thoughtfully, casting his mind back to the warehouse. "Something about how there was not much time, operations moving and that it was all about the ingredients. No idea what that meant. Problem with Eyebrow is that most words haven't been invented, many have to be substituted."

"Hmm…well the 'operations moving' probably means that they're going to be smuggling the rest of the wands soon. Especially if they have seen you two and know we're on their tail." Hermione picked up a bit of parchment from her desk and waved it at them. "The only way they can get the wands out is still through Customs, but the last report says that they still haven't found anyone trying to sneak the wands through. A few boxes have been found but most of them empty or…" Hermione squinted at the page, "containing things like _Mrs Miggin's Magical Man-pieces_. Other than that - quiet, Mister Malfoy. Some professionalism, please - other than that, the report has been pretty inconclusive. They're looking to us for answers. We've got to figure out how the hell they are doing it."

There was a pause in which no one came up with any theories, and eventually Draco asked for them to be dismissed because not only was it late, but "because I want a bloody shower too. My whole suit smells of those rank wands."

"Yes, yes. Fine. Go get some sleep. There's not much more that can be done tonight."

Draco left immediately, mumbling about the scent absorbency of Muggle Gucci.

"You okay?" asked Harry. Hermione nodded tiredly.

"Yes. Just stressed, you know. I didn't expect to always be under pressure taking a supervisor job. Who knew supervising could be so demanding. Ron says I should have just stayed in research." She pinched the bridge of her nose and squeezed her eyes closed, then opened them, trying to wake herself up a little. "Despite what Ron thinks, I'm still glad I didn't stay in research. I'd be stuck in the Ministry instead of with you guys."

Harry walked across the room and placed his lips to her brow, "I'm glad you came…even if you are a bossy boss."

Hermione threw a quill at his head. "For that comment, I want the written report of tonight's assignment on my desk by tomorrow." Her voice was stern but she briefly gripped his hand with a smile.

Harry laughed and gave her a salute, leaving her to finish her paperwork in peace and then eventually crawl into Ron's arms a few hours later for comfort, despite his opinion she should have never come to the field.

XXX

Harry had sat on his partner's bed, listening to the off-key singing and sound of water hitting the plastic base for a good twenty minutes. Draco always took notoriously long showers. The man was utterly afraid of being unclean for more than the immediate moment of contact with dirty substances. Harry always chalked it up to Narcissa's influence, because he could imagine her as the sort of mother that would use abrasive kitchen cleanser rather than spittle to wipe her child's cheek clean.

Draco came out of the en suite in just a towel, which wasn't unusual because that's what people with water dripping into their belly buttons did, but Harry felt unusually faint. He watched Draco locate underwear from his chest of drawers and put them on before towelling his hair dry. Once he was in boxers, Harry got up and went over to him. "Just popped in to tell you that Hermione still wants a written report on her desk by tomorrow."

"Yeah, yeah. Tomorrow. Suppose you'll be wanting me to do the actual write up, eh?"

"Yeah. That okay?" asked Harry, reaching out to stop Draco's hand in motion from towel drying his hair.

"It's fine." Draco didn't mind the report being foisted off on him, because at least the writing would be legible. "What are you looking at?"

"You have…something in your hair." Said Harry. He raked his finger through Draco's fringe. It felt like damp silk after a wanton dream, and he pulled out a few handfuls of some small blackened grains along with a couple of stands of pale hair.

They both peered down into Harry's palm. "What's that?" asked Draco.

"Don't know. But you're covered in it!" Harry went to extract some more from his partner's hair, the scent of Draco's shampoo getting under his fingernails. The feel of water-warmed chest pressing against his forearm as he reached up scalded Harry's skin into sensitivity. He dropped his eyes from the downy fibres to Draco's gaze.

For a long moment they looked at each other, and Harry felt his heart beat bang against his ribs and lungs. He could do it. The opportune moment had arrived. He could just lean down, and press his lips to Draco's soft -

"I GOT IT!" blinked Draco suddenly, stepping away and consequentially letting Harry's hand drop heavily from his hair. "It's all so obvious! Quick! Call your beaver, get everyone in the kitchen!"

Harry's heart halted out of hatred for his own cowardice, and his brain hadn't quite begun functioning again from what was almost the best moment of his life. "Eh?"

"I've done it," exclaimed Draco excitedly, running to find any old pair of jeans, "I know how the Death Eaters are smuggling the wands!"

Harry would have been impressed if he wasn't too busy being internally crushed with disappointment.

XXX

Robert wore green pyjamas to bed, it appeared, because he was once again sitting on the breadbin, probably wondering why he had been pulled out of sleep for an official meeting run by the bane of his existence. It seemed that Draco's animosity to Robert was slightly lessened by the fact that his six foot tall frame was decked in Slytherin colours, Harry mused, as he watched Draco walk towards the front of the crowd and briefly say, "Nice pyjamas, Jeff."

Robert's insistence that his Christian name didn't begin with J was unheard as Draco made his swift route to the fridge. Standing at the front, pictures and plans of the mission pinned to the fridge with magnets behind him, Draco cleared his throat. Everyone was already silent because they were too tired to talk to their neighbour beyond the first complaint that one of the patients had escaped the third floor again.

"Well everyone, the moment has come. You all thought I was crazy," said Draco, smirking at the room with irksome superiority, "And now it is time for me to prove that I have been a genius all along."

From his seat by the table, Harry thought Draco was trying to sell himself a little too hard.

"Granger, lock the kitchen door please. I don't want anyone leaving."

Hermione gave Draco a questioning look but complied, uttering under her breath incantations that warded the only exit heavily. It set an ominous tone, and everyone began to feel a little more awake because of the edgy atmosphere.

"I have figured out how the Death Eaters are smuggling wands containing human flesh as core substances back to England to aid Voldemort in the hostile takeover." Draco paused, trying to create some sort of tension. "It's all to do with…"

Harry looked at Ron who was barely awake, trying to prop his head up on the table. _Am I the only one who is on edge?_ thought Harry.

"…Tea."

There was an immediate uproar and even Harry thought Draco had lost it.

"That's it, I'm going back to bed. I knew he was obsessed!" exclaimed Ron, making towards the warded exit like many of the others. "Off his fucking rocker."

XXX

"SIT BACK DOWN!" growled Hermione, her wand aimed at her boyfriend who was leading the resistance of people trying to leave. "No one is authorised to step over that threshold until Agent Malfoy has explained. Back to your seats!"

Everyone grumbled and moved to sit back down. They all knew none of them would have any great success getting through Hermione's wards, and most of them had left their wands in their rooms. Ron ended up by the cooker, unable to claim back his seat next to Harry. Harry didn't mind, George's company was pleasant enough.

Once the crowd had settled down, Draco pinned a teabag to the fridge with a magnet in the shape of the island. "Tea." He stated. "It's been tea all along." Taking out his wand, he used it to point to the picture that detailed the Portkey centre. "Like Granger is always saying, one cannot Apparate in or out of Venice, so the only way that the Death Eaters can get the wands out are through Customs."

"We know this. Get to the point." groused Tonks, her hair starlight blue to match the negligee she was sporting.

"I hear you ask yourself, '_Why hasn't Customs' arrested Death Eaters, then?'_" said Draco, ignoring the interruption. "Well, that's because Customs officials use trained Nifflers to smell out any illegal substances and contraband being carried by the five thousand tourists and residents who pass through this hall every week. The reason that the Nifflers aren't smelling the Flesh Wands is because they're being packed in boxes of tea."

"…So?"

"Nifflers have one genetic defect that sets them back from being better than guard dogs, other than being dead ugly. They can't smell tea. Potter can confirm this."

Everyone's head swivelled to Harry, but he was too marvelled at Draco's genius to care. "It's true. Me and Draco were stationed on duty at the centre a while back and he snuck over to a restaurant while we were supposed to be working, and brought back tea -"

"Malfoy!" cried Hermione, scowling at the unapologetic blonde. Her hair had frizzed up another dress size with rage.

"And Draco got paranoid that one of the officer's Nifflers was trying to steal his tea. He told us that that was impossible because Nifflers cannot smell tea, but was probably after the milk that was in the drink."

"Exactly," nodded Draco, sparing Harry a smile before continuing, "You all thought I was obsessed, paranoid…even crazy for always complaining that someone was stealing all the tea. The Death Eaters have been stocking up on teabags and using the dried leaves to pad the wand cases and carry the weapons right under the noses of the Ministry's Nifflers. Me and Potter were at the stock warehouse today, and in a moment of genius I looked inside a crate which held some of the wands," Draco pulled out the flesh wand they had acquired earlier and held it up, "Like this one, but in the box were some unknown little black…things. I didn't know it until now, but it was leaves taken from teabags. I was right, people! Tea is the answer to all of life's problems!"

Everyone sat in silence for a moment. Stunned beyond belief. Then Hermione began to clap and slowly applause began to rise around the kitchen. For Draco. For Harry. For them. "Well done, Agent Malfoy. I shall definitely be putting your names forward for awards. You have served your country well with your madness and -"

Draco held up a hand to stop Hermione's rewarding tones. "There's more. It's an inside job."

Everyone stopped clapping and every head turned towards the breadbin. Draco's suspicions and enmity had never been kept quiet. Robert stopped clapping, himself, and glared, "It's not me!"

"That's just what a traitor would say!" growled Ron, moving through the crowd to seize up the PJ-clad agent.

"Stop, Weasley. It's not him." said Draco after a moment, enjoying watching Ron try to shove Robert inside the breadbin. Moving around the room, Malfoy stopped behind Jessica and placed his hands on her trembling shoulders. "Now, Jessica." He leaned down and placed a kiss to her cheek and then pressed his wand into the side of her throat, "I am placing you under arrest in the name of the Ministry of Magic, under suspicion of crimes against England. You are suspected of orchestrating the trading and exportation of weapons of mass destruction between your day job cover, and the charge of impersonating a member of the St Mungo's psychiatric ward may very well be held against you before the Wizengamot. You have the right to remain silent, anything you say can, and will, be used against you in a court of law."

No one interfered and Ron watched with astonishment while his slackened fingers were still wrapped around Robert's neck.

Harry remembered Draco's face lighting up as he first met her at the Portkey centre, eyes caressing her smaller, attractive stature over her friends who appeared uncomfortable in their own skins. He suspected Polyjuice potion.

Harry thought about the rain that had drizzled into his leather trousers as he listened to a diminutive sized hooded figure command known Death Eaters with a high-pitched effeminate voice from a church courtyard.

He remembered the broken cup and frightened Franken-bird on the kitchen floor, with a panicking woman hastily picking up the shattered pieces of porcelain while he and Draco reported their first reconnaissance mission from the warehouse.

He also recalled the cup Snape had held a few hours ago, sporting the same slogan that Draco had hand-painted on Harry's birthday a year ago. He remembered the cracked mug that had clearly been improperly magicked back into shape, and he was sure that Snape had never been partial to such statements like "_I saved the world and all I got was this stupid scar_".

"I knew there was a reason I didn't like you." said Harry, glaring at Jessica.

XXX

TBC (updates are going to come sooner now people, promise!)

**Author's Note:** So...It was the Original Character all along. You know, you can't trust those OCs, treat them with caution, they're all sodding plot devices! Devious buggers. So, what do you think eh? Tell me your speculation, people! Cookies to those who tells me in a review what they think!


	11. Chapter 11

**Chapter Eleven**

Jessica's cover effectively blown, and the unveiling of Draco as a mastermind all along, with the concept of tea as the answer to all life's equations were truths universally acknowledged with a lot of drama. Hermione had unlocked the kitchen door and Jessica was lead by Ron to the holding room on the fifth floor to undergo interrogation and house arrest with twenty-four hour surveillance.

She had passed by Draco gracefully, head bowed and muttered, "Well done. You're very clever."

Draco, showing a rare moment of modesty, replied, "I was well played though, you had me going for a while. I think it was the black bra, white shirt combination that threw me most."

Jessica did not pass Harry with the same composed presence, and with a smirk, said in a voice loud enough for half the kitchen to hear, "You're a piss-poor Auror. The reason only you hated me was never because you suspected me of ill intent. You were too busy being jealous and starting at your partner's arse." Harry's cheeks felt hot, like chilli had been rubbed into every pore. "I hope my master kills you in the end."

Ron dragged her away before she could spout anymore, but the damage was done. Harry studiously ignored Draco's glances as Hermione assigned Tonks and Jeff to check the warehouse immediately. "I suspect they may pack up and leave as soon as possible because they have sighted Agent Malfoy and Potter. Come back quickly - you don't need to go inside, just check if it's inhabited. There should be a window down the alley-side you can peer through."

After all the excitement, many of the others were heading back to bed and Harry followed the flow of people to escape the kitchen quickly, heading to his room to hide forever.

He was just pulling back the covers of his bed to climb in when there was a knock at the door. He stood stock still, wondering for a moment if he could ignore it. He stood, waiting. The knock sounded again. Huffing, his face already turning what he knew to be a very patriotic colour of red, went to open the door.

Draco was standing against the threshold, arms folded across his chest, looking smug. Harry's last hope was that his partner would have the common decency to not gloat over his silly infatuation.

"So you fancy me."

He had a Slytherin partner, decency was sparse.

"I - I - I - I'm, err, I can explain. I-I'm so sor -"

Draco took a single step forward, one knee resting between Harry's as their bodies pressed flush against each other, and tilted his head upwards to join their lips. Their chests hitched against one another's and the rim of Harry's glasses dug deep into his cheek as Draco's tongue slipped over his.

Harry had almost inhaled Draco's lips with shock, and nearly choked with sheer surprise when he was slipped a bit of tongue. The only thought that could enter his head was _I can feel your nipples with my nipples…Nipple porn!_

After Harry caught up with the reality of the moment and the fact that Draco Malfoy was a man with a very clever mouth, he attentively dared to reciprocate. Shifting closer somehow, he caught Draco's bottom lip between his teeth, sucking lightly and reaching out a hand to curl around the blonde's body. He chased Draco's tongue which had retreated back into his mouth, desperately trying to make the kiss deeper. He wanted wedge Draco against a door, his bedroom door or any door, floor, wall or conveniently placed elephant flank and possess him for wasted time, because here was Draco now. Draco, kissing him right now and even though it wasn't the sort of kiss that tilted his axis and blew his world to pieces, it was Draco and Draco was -

Draco stepped back before Harry could secure purchase on his hips, leaning out of the extremely chaste kiss and gave a smirk. They hadn't even kiss long enough for his lips to swell and turn the alluring pink Harry always imagined they would.

"Naturally, I knew all along." Said Draco.

Harry gapped as Draco winked and headed towards his own room.

xxx

The whole of HQ slept in late that day because the midnight meeting left everyone tired and unsociable. Harry's sleep had been fitful. After two wanks, and a quick shower watching his sperm wash down the drain, he had spent most of the night being awoken by his own worry that the kiss was merely a token of acknowledgement, a one time offer or simply a joke. Slytherins were cruel by nature and Harry stayed in bed all morning to avoid his partner. Who probably wasn't up anyway because Draco was a lazy git.

When he finally dragged himself out of bed because Justin's voice had sounded about the house, yelling that full attendance was required for a follow up meeting, Harry found himself moving slow. It took him an extra five minutes to get dressed just because he stood on his own balcony, which was bare to the iron and red with rust, to gaze down at the murky waters of a canal running along the south side of the Headquarters.

When he did make it down to the kitchen, he was the last to enter and very gratified to see Draco wedged into his normal place on the microwave. Arms crossed, standing at the door, he listened to the depressing report from Tonks and Robert.

"The whole place was bare. Not a tea leaf in sight, let alone any crates. They've moved on. We were able to enter the area and no surveillance was left in place or anything. Diagnostic spells indicated that the place had been disabled of all magic. We did a preliminary sweep of other industrial hotspots in the area and…well, both myself and Agent Ruskin believe…" Tonks looked anxious to say whatever they had theorised, "that they have left Venice."

Harry felt his stomach drop a few inches. If the Death Eaters really had left the island then it meant they had failed. England was the only battlefield now. Hermione confirmed this by reading out a follow up report from the Portkey Customs.

"A large mass of people carrying boxes went through customs but the Nifflers never picked up on any contraband and therefore the customers were not searched because of Privacy Act of Helga Hordanilia of Seventeen-twelve. Conclusive decision was that the boxes were legal and suitable for porting. All customers were allowed to leave the Island of Venice."

"Probably more of Mrs Miggin's Magical Man-Pieces." Consoled Draco.

As Hermione rolled the parchment up, she ignored Draco's comment and cast a knowing look about the faces of the room, she added, "We leave tomorrow morning. At Six. Pack this evening, take care of any personal business and get a good night's sleep. We have been recalled to the Ministry to 'offer aid and assistance to the resistance against the forces of the Dark Lord'. Dismissed."

Harry saw Ron place a hand on Hermione's shoulder and press a small kiss to the side of her jaw. A rare moment of public affection and comfort between the two. The kiss made Harry turn his eyes towards Draco, and saw the silver eyes smirking back at him with a gleam.

xxx

Harry had packed hours ago, and now had nothing left to do. Already contemplated the canals, his ceiling and whether he can be bothered to clean the plughole of his bath, Harry finally decided it was time to see if Draco thought he was a disgusting pervert.

He was greeted by a pale chest when he stood on the third floor landing. Draco looked only a little surprised and gestured for him to enter. "Tea?"

"Your nipples are always hard and it's indecent. You should tape them down or something so you don't turn people into queers." Replied Harry.

Draco stared at his own nipples thoughtfully. "It's because I live in a permanent state of arousal. You know, you should really have some tea. I've got to drink the rest of my supply before we leave tomorrow - I don't think they'll let me take any Tetley through customs considering what happened today."

"Oh, yeah. Sure. Got any Earl Grey?"

As Draco made tea, Harry fidgeted in a seat on the balcony. The street beneath was void of people but chants floated on the air from the church, signing the dusky evening as a Sunday. Unlike England, Europe was not a twenty four hour society. The whole of Italy and it's consequential islands would completely shut down at noon everyday for lunch and Sunday evenings would be the day of rest as decreed by the Lord and his many lazy Europeans. It had taken Harry a while to get used to taking lunch at lunchtime and having Sundays spent in bed, for even the Death Eaters had embraced the time style of the Venetians. Draco had always declared that Italians were clever people as they recognised Tea to need it's own break.

Draco placed a cup of Earl Grey in front of Harry and then sat down in the chair opposite him. Taking a sip of peppermint tea, he said slowly, "So, England tomorrow. You know what that means…"

"Err..?"

"Uniforms. I am so glad I don't have to dress up in those hideous auror robes, the cut is not my style."

"I don't mind them," shrugged Harry. He took a sip and the beverage burned the roof of his mouth and crusted off half his taste buds. He put the cup down and looked at Draco. Besides smirking as if Slytherin had won the house cup, he was acting perfectly normal and Harry felt he could live at peace knowing that their friendship wasn't ruined.

"Well you wouldn't. You look good in them." stated Draco.

Normally, comments like that were merely a throw-away opinion but Harry could still remember how agile Draco's tongue was, and felt his face burn under the remark. Draco smirked and placed his cup down. He stood and moved to the bracket of Harry's outstretched legs. If Harry moved his legs, he could wrap them around Draco's calves and trip him forward and say it was an accident and…

"What are you doing?" he asked.

"Last day being abroad," Draco smiled and leaned forward, "When in Rome…"

The kiss was not as sensual as their first, and not nearly as desperate, but Harry didn't care. Draco had climbed into his lap and far from wondering if the welding would keep, all he could do was grip the fine hair on Draco's head to keep him from retreat. They bit, sucked, licked and battled tongues for a good ten minutes, by which time Harry's muscles had turned to jelly as he relaxed under the assault, feeling more confident that Draco was going no where anytime soon.

When their mouths finally did part, Harry panted for air as Draco plucked at his shirt, pulling the hem out of his trousers and yanking it up. "C'mon Potter, cooperate. Lift up." Harry lifted up his arms and lost sight of Draco as the t-shirt was pulled over his head. His glasses were dragged off with the collar and when Draco lobbed the piece of clothing over the balcony, Harry cried out in despair. "Fuck Draco! My glasses!"

"We'll get them later." Draco pinned Harry into his chair with a hand on his chest and slithered out of his lap into the V of his thighs and began to work on the button of Harry's jeans. _Oh…what are glasses again?_ Thankfully, being short-sighted, Harry could see every detail of Draco's hands, from the little scar on the knuckle of his right forefinger, and the defiant signet ring on his left hand that he never removed even though he was no longer part of that family. Every detail of the hand that was pulling down the zipper of his trousers and tugging the flaps aside.

Harry would have replied that he would have dumped Justin in an instant if he knew his feelings were reciprocated, but all that escaped his throat was a strangled moan as Draco pulled down the elastic band of his boxers. The rough material scrapped the length of Harry's cock before the sensation of a hot hand curled around it filled all his fantasies.

But that was the problem, wasn't it. This wasn't _all_ his fantasies, because all of them included repeat performances. _Is this just a holiday fling before we go back to England?_ Harry cleared his throat and asked attentively, "When in Rome?"

Draco paused and looked up at him. "Yes. It's a saying. When in Rome, do as Roman's do."

"I've heard it…but…we're not in Rome."

Draco huffed. "Rome is in Italy, Venice is in Italy. When in Venice then. Whatever, do you really want me to stop and argue geography with you now?!"

"No!" Harry reached down quickly to grasp a hand around Draco's pumping wrist. "No…don't stop."

Draco gave him a measuring look, but continued to work his hand up and down the length of Harry's cock. The dry friction was rough, on the side of uncomfortable as Draco's calluses rubbed against his sensitive foreskin and head, and Harry wouldn't have complained even if Draco was trying to hammer a nail through his scrotum. It wouldn't have matter one jot, because Draco was here and his attention was on Harry, not on any silly Hufflepuffs or undercover Death Eaters. Harry was in heaven because Draco was looking at _him_, goddamn it!

Properly looking at him. Grey eyes were slatted as they traced every inch of Harry's face, as if looking for some sort of deception in his features. It was a little intimidating and if it wasn't a physical reaction, Harry was sure his erection would have withered under the scrutiny. Whatever Draco had been looking for, whatever quality he was trying to measure Harry against, he seemed to have found because his face blossomed into a smirk. He was gorgeous and Harry wanted to kiss him again. That was an impossibility because Draco gave a wink to add to his boyish charm before leaning right over and licking the length of Harry's cock.

"MERLIN!"

Harry's hand flew down to press his fingers through Draco's soft hair and touch his scalp, irrationally checking that his penis hadn't appeared through the other side of Draco's head with the force he'd bucked his hips. "Sorry! Y-you okay?" asked Harry. Had he smashed his partner's nose?

Draco gave another confident swipe of his tongue and Harry fairly sure he was fine.

Dextrous fingers drew patterns above his genitals, massaging the flesh exposed by his open flies as Harry watched Draco's tongue lap at the heavy vein on the underside of his cock. Each lick killed a couple of hundred brain cells, and soon Harry was blathering a string of utterances begging for _more, please, stop teasing, please Draco, more!_

Draco's fingers dipped further down to touch lightly at Harry's balls. They were drawn up close to his body and ready for every little touch Draco was willing to bestow.

Luckily, it turned out that Draco will willing to bestow quite a lot.

"O-oh!" Harry chest hitched as the air caught in his throat and his jaw drop with complete surprise. Draco's lapping tongue had clued him into greater oral pleasures but Harry was totally unprepared for the hot mouth taking him right to the root, flexing throat muscles clenching around his sensitive head and soft suction almost sending him to completion right there and then. All Harry could do was grip the arms of the rickety garden chair as he was swallowed slowly, pink lips perfectly sealed around his shaft.

Draco took a few moments to explore the new flesh at his disposal, alternating between analytical swipes of his tongue that left Harry wondering if there was a God kind enough to bestow a less teasing partner, to which the question was quickly answered every time Draco showed off his impressive lack of gag reflex with long consuming movements that had Harry tapping his tonsils.

After a couple of minutes Draco seemed satisfied that he had learnt all there was to know about Harry's dick and took to building up a regular rhythm of shallow motions with his mouth but with more suction, hollowing out his cheeks like a pouting model. Harry reached out one shaky hand and pressed his thumb into the hollow on the right side of Draco's face, feeling the added pressure on the left side of his penis as it glided in and out of Draco's infamously snarky mouth.

"I'm - I think I'm…g-going to…" Harry wanted to give him warning. It was only gentlemanly, and he should have been rewarded for being so chivalrous at a time of great distraction from his senses. But when Draco pulled away, his teeth grazing his foreskin and he pulled away almost made Harry cry and wish he'd just come down the bastard's tight, hot throat. _Fucking cock-tease! _Sobbed Harry internally. He wanted to reach out and haul Draco's head back into his lap, but instead he gripped the chair harder and ignored the tea cups rattling violently in their saucers as Draco sat back on his heels between the spread of Harry's legs, and fucking lick his lips clean of pre-come.

"So," Said Draco. Harry was pleased to note he sounded raspy. Harry's only saving grace was that Draco was still rolling his balls around inside the confines of his jeans. "How are we going to do this, hmm?"

"Gnagh."

Draco raised an eyebrow. "Coherent." He looked at Harry again with a studious look and then at the chinking cups as Harry tried not to explode every bit of crockery on the island. A boyish smile rose over Draco's features as he formulated his own plans for exactly how they were going to do things.

Wiggling his eyebrows and rising himself, Draco said, "Stand up, trousers off."

xxx

**Author Note: Very important: **This site is picky about their porn, and because of this, the next chapter will be MISSING! Chapter 13 will be up soon...if you wish to read the porny version, go over to my LJ (my homepage as shown on my author page) which will have every little, dirty...filthy...lovely detail.

TBC


	12. Chapter 12

**Chapter Twelve**

Harry tried to stand, but his legs wobbled and other parts of his body pointed at Draco from the flare of his undone flies like a compass finding north. The Venetian air was stifling but hit Harry's spit-slick dick like a chill, sending shivers up his spine. He watched predatorily as Draco slid down his own trousers, the black material getting kicked back through the French windows, back into the bedroom, closely followed by his red boxers.

Harry blinked. _Red boxers?_ He tried to give an incredulous look and indicate to the boxers in Eyebrow. Draco gave a little laugh and stepped forward to help ease Harry out of his own trousers.

"You're clearly a novice at Eyebrow. That face you just pulled meant you wanted me to see if the custard had set in your lap yet." Draco pushed the trousers down completely and Harry stepped out of them. Draco looked at Harry's naked lap and said, "Nope. No custard there. Honestly Potter, that's the worst pick up-line ever, and your pronunciation is terrible."

Harry smiled and gave another wiggle of his eyebrows as he made an unsteady step into Draco's space. Draco snorted at whatever message Harry had coded to him and reached out to put a hand on Harry's hip, reeling him into another kiss. They together stood in that dusking air, kissing one another in a languid pace while Harry thought about how much sooner they could have done this. Draco's grip on his waist, and the soft rutting of their bare groins against one another was like sweet victory. Something they should have done long ago when snakes and lions defined their lives.

**

Throwing his arm across the surface, the cups and tea set went smashing to the veranda floor. Draco cleared the garden table and whipped back round to smash his lips back to Harry's. After a battle of tongues, they separated with gasping breathes and Draco croaked out low, "Bend over the table and grab the edge."

Quick to comply, Harry threw himself over the slab, only to regret his haste when the cold metal bit into his skin. "Agh. Fuck." Draco silenced his complaints by counteracting the temperature problem. His weight pressed against Harry's back, pushing him down into the table design with warm persistence, leaning over to bite and nibble at Harry's ear. His teeth were blunt and the pressure was hard, and Harry was sure his earlobe was bleeding fountains. Draco was unlikely to do that though, the clean freak.

Draco bit and nipped a trail over Harry's jaw, neck, shoulders and spine, and downwards. The rise of his buttocks got special attention and no matter how many times he thrust his arse outwards like a wonton slut, Draco continued to need the flesh their with his teeth, vice grip on Harry's hip to restrain his movements. Harry had never had a love bite on his bum before, and he wondered if sitting down was going to be a problem. Then he wondered why he was worrying about that when it was very likely that the thing tapping against Harry's calf was going to be the reason why he would not be sitting down much the next day.

When moist, hot air ghosted over his entrance, Harry's stomach and sphincter clenched at the thought of a rimjob. While Justin had always been happy to comply, Harry never wanted to ask because then he would have to return one. Double standards, maybe, but Harry's refined taste buds could never handle the practice. And, apparently neither could Draco's because other than a brief swipe of hot muscle along his crack, no tongue breached his body. Instead, hot breath continued to press against his most sacred area, warming the skin to receive the shock that was cold gel squeezed in between his arsecheeks. "You could have warned me!"

"I like to hear you squeal like a girl."

"I'm not a girl." Growled Harry, pressing his forehead on the table's circumference.

"Hmm, I noticed." Draco said, spreading the gel around with one finger. "Quick question…"

"Hmm?" Harry bucked against the table and his penis became intimate with the cold chill of green iron.

"You've bottomed before. Right?" Harry turned his head and looked around his own hips, back at Draco. Draco's cheeked turned a little pink and Harry wanted to lick him and see if he tasted of strawberries. "I just figured between you and Flinchy, you're slightly less feminine than him."

"Thanks." Deadpanned Harry. "It's not about femininity."

"I only wore lipstick that time Blaise and pansy thought I'd make a pretty French maid." Replied Draco.

Harry didn't know what to say to that and decided that he was going to get fucked by a mental patient. "You're insane. Yeah I've bottomed before. Get on with it."

"They made me wear a pinafore." Continued Draco, circling his finger once more before Harry left the familiar intrusion of a finger. His stomach felt hollow at the sensation and as it withdrew and pushed back in; it was like his half a cup of tea sloshed in a counter clockwise motion under his diaphragm. The feeling got worse when a second finger joined and Harry pushed back in time with the scissor motion that was stretching precious muscle in preparation. "It was a white pinafore with lace! And they had me in those little black skirts and my hair in pigtails -"

"Why are you telling me this?"

"Be quiet and concentrate." Harry wasn't sure what he was supposed to be concentrating on, Draco's inane blather or the third finger pressing into his prostate, sending fire crackers across his eyelids. "Anyway, at some point, after almost spraining my ankles in heels…by the way, this was the Christmas party and I was drunk, I'm not a fetish whore…"

"Course not. More."

"Like this?"

"Yeah."

"So, Blaise has decided that I should wear the French knickers too because the leg of my boxers kept dropping down. I wasn't going to let them put me in girls' knickers and there was this big argument, and I said it was girly, and to cut a long story short," Draco pulled his fingers out and stood behind Harry. He placed one hand down on the small of Harry's back to keep him still, and the other one he stroked himself a couple of times before positioning the head of his cock to Harry's clenching hole, "Blaise decided to show me that wearing French knickers wasn't girly and pulled his own trousers down. Cheeky sod had been wearing a pair all night since dinner. Naturally, I laughed and he said something that kept with me for years. He said, '_even though I'm wearing knickers, you're the one who's in the dress. Now bend over the bed, Malfoy'_."

"I don't want to hear about your pass lovers while you're -"

"Know that I respect you and that I think you are very masculine," cooed Draco, gently rubbing Harry's back dimples before pushing forward. "I respect your body."

"Oh god!"

"Violating you like this does not mean that I think of you as my own personal sex toy."

"Whatever! Move!"

"I would also like to state for the record that I am not intending to use this encounter as blackmail at a later date and that -"

"Stop reading me my rites!"

"But -"

Harry hefted himself onto his forearms, groaning as a little bit of Draco slipped out of his body when he turned to glare over his shoulder. "I'm not going to sue you or report you for sexual assault. However, if you do not fucking move I'm going to throw you over the side of the fucking balcony!"

Draco held his hands up. "Alright, alright. Just checking. You can never be too sure. Lie back down."

Harry sent one last glare and pressed his torso back into the table. It hadn't been a great start. Rather than the lust-fogged, mind-numbing fuck he had been expecting, were he could simply lie there and become distantly aware of his body, basking in the pleasure…he instead felt like he was getting another strip search in the Auror Department's Medical office.

Harry waited patiently for Draco, who stood for a moment or two, buried inside with his thighs flushed against the back of Harry's, motionless.

He waited.

And waited.

And waited.

Until Draco said, "I still want you to be my partner."

Harry sighed. "I'm not going to report you!"

"No, I get that. But I like how we are." Draco leaned forward and Harry felt his hot chest align across his back, lips touching the nap of his neck, "And if I fuck you like you need fucking," a jab of the hips and Harry suddenly had hope for their embarrassingly platonic atmosphere to vanish, "Then I want you to promise that thing are not going to be awkward for us."

"Believe me, do a good job now and I'll never be awkward again." Harry would have promised to have the dark mark tattooed on his arse if only the dolt would move. Decided enough was enough, Harry jutted his hips backward and both men groaned. _Oh…_

"Fuck, Potter…" Draco growled and pulled at Harry's hips. Harry repeated the motion and they both gave another groan. "Oh you're…" Whatever Harry was he never found out. Draco hid his face in the back of Harry's neck and allowed Harry to surge back and forth beneath him, pulling up away from the hard shaft inside him and then pushing back forcefully.

It was awkward, and Harry's elbows were trapped underneath him as his fingers dangled through the holes in the table's pattern. His forehead started to prickle with perspiration, the effort alone making his legs begin to tremble because not only was he lifting his weight, but Draco's as well.

"I c-cant…you're too -" Even hot, sweaty and high on lust, Harry knew that calling Draco heavy would not lead to a good pounding. "I'm too tired…please, I can't keep it…"

Draco teeth scrapped his shoulder as he straightened up. Harry groaned at the change of angle, Draco penetrated further now that his hips were not curved and his fingers pinched into the skin on Harry's hips.

The perfect feeling of a hard cock moving in and out of his body, filling his insides until the swirling motion in his stomach settled into a steady _swish swash_ of their bodies was like heaven. Draco's body moved behind him, about him, in a fixed rhythm while one of his hands ran the length of Harry's side. From armpit to hip, along his ribs, raking scratches into his skin and then smoothing them with a firm palm from hip back up to armpit. Harry could hear the little gasps Draco was making over the noises emitting from his own mouth, which, shameful to admit, were something akin to a moaning porn star.

"Faster…please, Draco, go…_yes_, yes…god harder…"

"You're fucking greedy, Pott-ah! Slut." Draco slapped Harry round the back of the head lightly and Harry stopped clenching his muscles like he was trying to keep Draco from ever leaving his body. _If only superglue didn't make your nether-regions rash up…_

The shattered pieces of china on the floor began to rattle as Harry felt the slow pressure building up in the bit of his stomach. So close it was painful, Harry rock himself back again into the cradle of Draco's hips, the sound of flesh on flesh echoing loudly in the Fidelius boundary, and there was no way to describe the repeated meeting of the bodies until the hot sizzle of ice cubes sliding inside his intestines slid those crucial inches lower into his balls. He wanted to turn around, see Draco's face slack with ecstasy and watch through pleasure-slit eyes his own compressing orgasm squeeze Draco to the same happy end.

However, his only view was the shadows of the table and his own body on the floor beneath him. He had to clench his eyes extra tight and just _feel_ Draco hands, the half-moon indents on his left hip and the quickened slide of his partner's slick erection pushing rapidly into him. Harry moaned and hoped the welding of the table would hold under the pleasure of his orgasm.

As every last drop of corded liquid spilled out of his cock and fell into a puddle of spilt tea, Harry could only lay docile as Draco pumped the last few times into his sated body. The blonde's shudder and sharp snap of hips, with a quite 'gaaaah' was the only signal before warm liquid coated his aching insides. Harry pressed the side of his face to the metal and smiled to himself. _What a shit shag._

After a few minutes, a pair of damp lips pressed into his shoulder as Draco slipped out of his body. Draco straightened up, but then his legs seemed to change his mind for him, and he collapsed to the floor in an ungraceful heap to look at the leafy ceiling of the veranda. Harry thought that was a good idea and slid off the table too, landing heavily on Draco's chest, winding him.

"That was…"

"Crap, yeah." Draco gave him a sheepish nudge, Harry wanted to lick him. So he did. Draco smiled and nudged him again, hard enough to bruise. "Don't worry, we'll practise lots and become Kings of Sex." Harry liked that idea and nudged Draco back.

Giggling from their position on the floor, both men watched as the Franken-bird did some sort of mating display in response to the fragrance of sex in the room. Spindly legs flailing and little wings flapping erratically, the little yellow bird was hopping across every other floorboard like a muggle child stepping on the black stripes of a zebra crossing. They occasionally took turns to pinch each others nipples in a childish display of who could turn on who the most, but mostly settled to sleep in for a night in the arch of the French windows.

They didn't bother to dress, but spent the time unashamedly displayed before one another while Draco told Harry about his desire to go to Egypt and buy a camel named Lionel. Harry had discovered that what he had previously perceived to be a large merging of freckles was actually a budding bruise. He nudged Draco again.

**

As the sun began to rise over the canal waters and movement began in the house, they were forced to get dress after one last touch and grope. Six o' clock was not far away and soon they would be returning to the motherland. It was a depressing thought really, because snoozing in Draco's arms only to be woken by a pinch on his bottom, was like being on a holiday and he would much rather stay in Venice than go home to fight a war.

"Think we could just stay here?" Harry suggested.

"I could get my mother to write me a sick note. Explaining that I am a fragile boy. Granger would understand." Draco spoke around his toothbrush, insisting on getting the fur off his dentals before packing away the instrument in his suitcase.

Harry's packed bags lay next to the door of his room on the floor below, and the banging and bumping of the other inhabitants in the house was pressing in on his tranquil state as he observed Draco packing mouthwash and his favourite teacups. It would be time to leave soon.

"I've missed home." Stated Draco as he put a rolled pair of navy socks in the bowl of one of his teacups to cushion its journey in his baggage. It was a ridiculously mundane thing for someone like Draco to do and Harry wanted to kiss him.

"I wish this was home." Replied Harry.

Draco looked over to him, assessed his eagle-spread sated form, and smirked. "You just like the tourist-sex. Admit it."

Harry looked over to Franken-bird who had nestled inside a teacup, waiting patiently to be packed. He studied the mutant bird for a second, contemplating how unnatural it was before he gathered the courage to say to the room in general. "I like you. I want to have tourist-sex in England too."

After a long pause, his view of Franken-bird was blocked by a pair of long legs wrapped in denim, and felt dry lips touch the side of his face. Lips brushing eyelashes that fanned the corner of his eyelids. "In England, that's just plain sex."

**

"Can't we have something a little more...fashionable?" asked Draco, looking at the portkey that even Harry was holding at arm's length in case anyone mistook him for willingly associating with such an object. Officer Sultral rolled his eyes, disbelief expressed at how the two men in front of him ever achieved official status.

"I agree. It doesn't smell particularly nice. Which bridge did you get this from under?" Harry tried to breathe through his mouth, but the stink-waves of mould, violets and stagnant canal water washed over his taste buds. He wanted to gag his guts on Officer Sultral's shoes. "Give us a different one."

"Sorry, there's just enough for one between three. No trades." Officer Sultral seemed to take sick pleasure in Draco's features as he eyed the little old lady's floral shopping hanging from Harry's fingers. The fabric was wet and the pink base colour was smeared with light brown mud.

"Eugh, I'm not porting with them!" cried Justin, pinching his nose in Harry's direction.

Despite any caution towards their unhygienic portkey, Draco moved closer to Harry, one finger resting in the belt loop on the side of his jeans. It would have been an idle pose if not for the smug-as-fuck look Draco was projecting. Justin paled a little as he looked upon the unholy partnership, and then he sneered. Harry vaguely noted that Justin was a lot hotter with a sneer on his face, blonde hair falling into his face and fists clenched as he vaporised them with his glare.

"Thirty seconds!" cried Hermione from somewhere in the crowd. People began gathering in little packs of three, like trios of Indians around a campfire. Centring around mangy Muggle objects rather than fire.

Justin and Draco moved forward to touch the handbag, and as Edward the guard-niffler sniffed at Harry's trouser leg, Officer Sultral pulled out a gold pocket watch from within his robes and began to count to the hall. "Party of the Ministry of England, leaving in…nine…eight, seven…six…"

Harry inhaled deeply, hoping to take one last breath of the Venetian air, but his lungs clogged with the rank of the portkey. He hoped it was Draco's hand on his arse as he felt the sharp tug on his navel.

The world folded in on them, a swirl of colours moving in Harry's vision and the fluid sloshing violently about his ears made gravity an immaterial force to the disagreement of his senses. After a few minutes, eyes shut tight and vowing to Jesus, Buddha and Merlin that he'd never touch another portkey again, Harry felt the soft, muddy ground smack forcefully into his shoulder blades and thighs as they reached their destination.

Lying in the muddy field, dark clouds in the grey sky dropping fresh water onto his disorientated body, Harry didn't bother to upright himself and take in the sight of Estuary farmland. He just stayed horizontal as goosebumps prickled his skin, squinting through the droplets on his glasses.

"Oh my hair." Moaned Draco somewhere to his left. "Flinchy, get your luggage off me! Christ, have you got a boulder in there?!" Something sharp jabbed Harry in the ribs. "Don't let a little bit of weather kill you. We've got a war to fight and I'm not doing it by myself. So get up."

Harry defied Draco by laying in the mud a while longer, trying to shirk his duty as Saviour for just a little longer. Another jab in the ribs made him squeal.

"Oi, no dying." Commanded Draco.

**

TBC

Author note: Okay, so i've been a little bit naughty, but there is stuff in here that is important in the rest of the story, and I have already gone beyond R in the last chapter, so...I won't tell if you won't. If you do have a problem with this, email me and I will take it down - I'd rather have a lack of understanding in the story than have my account taken. Thanks. x


	13. Chapter 13

**Chapter Thirteen**

"So what did your mum say about us?"

Draco raised an eyebrow. "I don't imagine ever telling my mother that the man who tried to imprison her husband many times is my new shag."

Harry sulked. "He started it."

The boardroom had a long mahogany table that seated thirty. Only twenty-five of the seats were filled, for the other twelve members that completed the Venetian sector were in another conference room held for administrative portion of the team. Ron was having Tonks morph into Hermione's form so that he could endure her absence, but she was unable to pull off a good resemblance. Tonks had impersonated Hermione's kind features well, but the overall affect was ruined because the sheer volume of Hermione's hair defeated her.

They had all been given the morning to visit friends and family before heading to the ministry for briefing on the country's situation. Harry had spent the morning having Mrs Weasley shove sausages down his throat and asking where his nice girlfriend, Justine, was. Malfoy had apparently spent the morning not talking about Harry.

"You failed." This statement was Head Auror Shacklebolt's first words as he stood at the head of the table. "Too late did this revelation about the effects of tea on Nifflers occur! You were all given carte blancs to achieve whatever end possible to stop the smuggling of the Flesh Wands, and instead I have the return on the Dark Lord's army back on our shores, armed to the hilt! I know you all filled out reports but I am too busy to read them now. Tell me who is responsible for this oversight of knowledge!" Every single finger, including Harry's, went to Draco. Shacklebolt, a man who had spent many months in the company of this particular Malfoy, sighed. "Hmm. Naturally."

Draco smiled winningly and took another sip of the tea that had been provided. It tasted like irony.

Kingsley flicked his wand and the pile of folders flew about the room. Harry opened the file that settled in front of him and gritted his teeth. Looking to his left, Draco had turned a paler shade and tilted his chin up as he glared down at the pictures.

The mangled bodies and cold dead eyes looked up from the paper, demanding to know why Harry, their saviour had failed. Why the half the auror squad had failed them. Why they had failed their mission.

"Elphias Doge, retired elder of the Wizengamot, and his children and grandchildren were all murdered on the twenty second of August. They were found in the family home north of London, the message 'day of reckoning' written above their bodies." Informed Shaklebolt. He turned the page of his own folder. Everyone copied and Draco made a noise in the back of his throat.

Turning to the next photo, Harry looked upon the picture of a young girl. Naked and no older than fourteen, her legs splayed and her grey skin peppered with lacerations.

"Daughter of Tiberius Ogden. Her father came home and found her body and…" he held up a photo to the rest of the boardroom. "promptly hung himself. Mrs Ogden took over his position on the wizengamot in early September, but was found dead in her office a fortnight later. Turn over to the next page."

Harry didn't want to turn over the next page, but reluctantly did so and was relieved to find a list instead. Names. A list of names, beside each name was a title of that person's job title.

"This is the record of suspicious deaths since August." Stated Shaklebolt. Harry felt sick. The list was long. "The Dark Lord is targeting the most influential members of society, knocking off the most powerful members of the Ministry more quickly than we can find people to replace them. News coverage has ensued mass panic and public morale is at an all time low." Kingsley shifted and cast an eye around the room as Shaklebolt spoke. "We've been trying to locate the Dark Lord's headquarters, but he is comfortably under fidelius. Our only choice is to wait for the next attack to capture and gain intelligence from prisoners."

"So…what are we going to do in the meantime? I'm not planning to be a quill pusher until something interesting comes along." Draco said, his cup of bitter irony pushed away from him. A drop of tea had spilled onto the picture of Elizabeth Ogden's raped corpse.

Shaklebolt smiled cruelly. "Oh don't worry Mr Malfoy. You wont be staying here."

**

On the table in the small library, there was a large pile of newspapers. Harry had spent the first hour of their arrival going through the pile and reviewing the 'mass panic' that Shaklebolt had spoken of. He had been very surprised to see that it was not only copies of The Prophet, but also the Daily Mail, Evening Standard, London Lite and other Muggle newspapers, which were littered with theories and suspicious on the numerous unexplained cases of murders ranging throughout London.

'The Death-Glare Murderer' was an uninventive pseudonym in Harry's opinion, but when he had to explain the alias to Draco, all he got was a blank stare. "Why not just call it the AK-Killer?" asked Draco. Harry spent the next twenty minutes explaining that guns didn't shoot beams of green light like wands and that the victims had no bullet wounds.

Muggles, muggleborns, blood traitors, spies, high society, low society, impoverished and empowered. Looking at the full case reports, Harry could see no common demographic between the victims of the death eater attacks. The only common element, as perceived by the Muggles, was that each victim showed no physically reasons for their deaths. Bruised and beaten, but never to the point of expiration.

Sick of staring at pictures of dead bodies, Harry got up from the table in the library and stretched his fingers heavenwards. A lower vertebrae cracked pleasantly, easing his stiff form as he rose to the window. The safe house overlooked the columns of St Paul's Church, rain splattering the stone monument, making it a darker shade that seemed to fit Harry's heavy heart; sunny Venice seemed a long way away from the blurry streets of Covent Garden.

"It's almost ten. Go to bed, Potter."

Harry nodded, and turned towards the door. He glimpsed at the pictures one more time before following Draco upstairs.

**

Harry had to ask. He had sat patiently, watching the blonde, and finally curiosity had got the better of him. "Where on earth did you find them?" asked Harry.

"Under the bed." Draco gestured to the bed Harry was sitting on. It was a single bed and plainly decorated, unlike the one in Venice, and belonged to some previous anonymous tenant of the building. The only thing that was not anonymous about the former owner of the room was that apparently he was a voyeur.

"But why are you using them?" Harry persisted.

Draco shrugged, the binoculars still pressed to his eyes. "Considering there is a murderer on the loose, you'd think the Muggles would tone down the nightlife a little."

The way that Draco was trying to get the binoculars to zoom like omnioculars, Harry suspected that Draco had discovered the Muggle outfits of the clubbers. His eyebrows were bobbing up and down around the lenses as he tried to gain focus.

"What do Muggles do in nightclubs?" asked Draco, still looking out the window.

"Erm…drink. Dance."

"Have you been to one of these clubs? Have you ever worn…corseted leather trousers?"

"The only time I have worn leather is when you made me." Stated Harry. He pulled a bare thread from the quilt. Draco swung around a blinked down the lenses of the binoculars, then grinned.

"You look good in leather. You should make it part of your uniform when you become a superhero."

"Superhero?" asked Harry, smirking. Draco finally put the binoculars down, red pressure rings circled his eyes and Harry wanted to throw him on the chipped floor and get splinters in his knees.

"Yes, superhero. You have already saved the world like twenty times over, and this time, when we get rid of the Dark Lord –"

"Voldemort."

"- again, then you will be dubbed as not just a hero, but a superhero. A hero only saves anyone once."

The thread came off and Harry wound it round his index finger tightly. "Do you think I am going to save everyone this time? You are the one who came up with the thing about the tea, it could be you. We could be heroes together."

Draco seemed to ponder this idea, and then stood up. He placed the binoculars down on the chair and moved over to the bed, stepping over his suitcase that was still unpacked and emitting a strangled chirping noise.

"I think I would not like to be a hero." Draco stood with his knees against the mattress and grabbed Harry's hand. He unwound the string from Harry's purple finger, then pulled the hand higher to lick a stripe down the centre of Harry's palm. It tingled. "If I were a hero, then I would have to find myself a princess, and unfortunately, you are way too masculine to wear a dress."

"Being a hero doesn't mean you have to be straight." Stated Harry. He could recall the letters from Daily Prophet readers, all telling him the contrary last year.

"I know…" Draco smirked and bit into Harry's hand, his sharp teeth sunk into the webbing between his thumb and forefinger. "But you have to admit, you tend to pick men who could pull off a skirt."

Harry was about to ask if Draco would demonstrate wearing a skirt, and what colour would the skirt be, when someone knocked at the door.

"What?" Snapped Harry.

There was a moment of silence while the person outside the door tried to figure out if they had come to the right room. "Err…Dinner." Giggled Tonks. Draco smirked and nudged his knee against the mattress, making Harry wobble.

As Draco walked to the door to greet an amused Tonks, Harry briefly wished his hand was made of mash potato so that Draco would come back for another nibble. Then he decided that was crazy because Draco didn't even like mash potato. Tea would be a much better option, even though liquid-hands would be very impractical. Plastic gloves only hold so much water, after all.

"C'mon, hero." Draco patted his leg seam in the same way posh people beckoned a dog, and Harry smugly reminded himself that he was richer than Draco.

**

Harry had a little red spot that had blossomed between his thumb and finger. His first love bite at the grand age of twenty-three. Justin had been staring at the blemish whilst stabbing his chicken to death, and Draco had been shovelling his chicken into his mouth at grotesque speeds because he thought Justin was trying to engage him in some sort of competition. Harry took no notice of either of them as he looked at the love bite with a funny sort of feeling in the pit of his stomach, a bit like love only much naughtier. Being in lust with someone always left marks, Harry had thought. Now in the middle of the night, trying to see his lust bite in the darkness, Harry thought himself to be a closet romantic.

_Honestly, how could bite marks ever be considered romantic?_ Thought Harry. He stuffed his hand firmly under his pillow and pinned it below his head. Inhaling deeply, he closed his eyes and tried to go to sleep.

Think nothing. Think nothing…think nothing…my hand itches…maybe he gave me rabies? I should go ask him if a dog has bitten him, or if Jessica was really a werewolf or – THINK NOTHING! How the hell is thinking about dogs thinking about nothing. Fuck sakes! Right, start again. Think nothing…be Zen…think nothing…

Harry huffed and pulled his hand out from under the pillow. He held it up to the neon glow coming from the window and tried to make out his lust bite. It was too dim.

Harry flung the covers back and hastily rummaged around at the end of the bed for some boxers and his wand. He was still pulling them over his hips as he stormed out the door to go to Draco's room.

**

Harry knocked on the door again. "Get up, you lazy bastard. It is cold out here!" hissed Harry through the wood.

Who the hell was asleep at three in the morning?! Harry knocked again and waited. No one answered.

Folding his arms across his chest, Harry frowned at the door. Why wasn't Draco answering? And why wasn't Justin or Tonks storming out of their rooms, because yes, some people did sleep at three in the morning, and demand to know what all the ruckus was about? Harry's frown deepened, then he cursed his own brain when he suddenly came up with the thought, _what if Draco has invited them for the threesome?_

_He hates Justin!_ Harry thought, trying to consol himself.

_He hates you, so what?_ Replied his brain.

_Tonks is a girl._

_She has powers, she could use them to morph into an ultra sexy boy. Like Tom Riddle._

Harry blinked. _Eww._ Scrubbing behind his glasses, he tried to rub away images of sexy Slytherins, for there was only one Slytherin for Harry and his one was blonde, goddamn it.

Harry decided that if he had seen Draco naked then there was no need to be waiting out in the corridor, and with that, he pulled out his wand from his elasticised waistband and spelled open the door.

Inside it looked as though Draco had battled with his suitcase. Franken-bird was hopping about madly among the spewed clothes, and the lid of the suitcase was no longer attached to the base, as though the owner had pulled the zipper too far round. The bed was still made and the binoculars were placed on the chair by the window in a lonely, haphazard fashion.

Thoughts of a blonde threesome ran through Harry's head again, but this time happening in Justin's room. Harry clenched his teeth and went across the room to the window. If Draco had succumb to Justin's charms and Tonk's morphing flexibility, then Harry had little chance of winning him back. He was not blonde after all, and dying his hair that colour was not an option because he'd glamoured it like that once before. Draco had told him that only pretty people could pull off being the colour of the sun.

Harry sighed and turned his hand over in the light coming from the streets below, where Muggles frolicked and partied mockingly in the face of the Death-Glare killer. The lust bite was still there. Harry stared at it for a while as he wondered where in the world Draco was. And as he stared, his gaze became unfocused a little due to tiredness. His eyelids felt heavy.

Shaking his head, Harry tried to discipline his pupils, and found himself focusing beyond his hand to the street below where a platinum blonde figure in illegally tight leather trousers was making his way through the crowd of Muggles. "Draco!" cried Harry, hitting the window. Draco didn't hear, but instead ducked into the nearest doorway and spoke to the bouncer. The velvet rope was moved and as quick as a bat of his blonde eyelashes, Draco slipped inside the club.

Harry scowled and pounded his fist against the window again. While sneaking off to go clubbing was better than having a threesome with co-workers, Harry felt insulted that his…whatever Draco was, had not invited him along.

Glaring at the club below that had tempted his partner out of the safety of the house, Harry noticed another person in the crowd with blond hair.

Fuck. Lucius.

**

TBC

Author's note: Two updates in one day! Gasp!...okay, it has gone beyond midnight so I suppose in two days. Anyways, hope you enjoyed, Merry belated Christmas! x


	14. Chapter 14

Chapter Fourteen

Decked in the clothes that had been sprawled across Draco's floor, Harry's ankles chilled in the night air as he ran through the crowded street. His breath pushed out in steamy torrents before his eyes, then was sucked back into his aching lungs like poison. "Please…" Gasp, "God, please!" Gasp, "Don't let me be late – please, oh God, oh God, let him be o – Oh, sorry!"

Normally, it was not part of Harry's nature to simply step over a Muggle he had just mown down. However, this was an emergency of the highest concern and her skirt was too short for her to be a decent, upstanding citizen, so what did it matter if her new outfit was covered in grime? Harry nudged his way up the line, all the while muttering under his breath with desperation, his eyes scanning wildly around him for white-blonde hair.

"Oi! He pushed!"

"Please, let me in, it's an emergency!" gasped Harry. The bouncer of 'Spades and Clubs' did not seem to understand from Harry's flushed face and frantic hopping that it really and truly an emergency. Instead, the bouncer's hand remained on the velvet rope and ran his eyes up and down Harry's body.

"Sorry dweeb, you ain't comin' in 'ere." Said the bouncer.

"Why not?!" Demanded Harry.

"Dress code. No slippers o' cast offs. Move it along, ra'y."

"Ratty?!" repeated Harry incredulously. A woman behind Harry nudged him and tried to flash the bouncer her tibia. Harry nudged her back. The bitch could wait her turn. Waving his finger at the bouncer, Harry did another thing that was typically against his nature. "Look here, I'm Harry Potter and I say let me in, there's someone in there who needs my help."

The bouncer was not a wizard, squib nor a magical boulder moonlighting as Muggle security. He was simply that. Muggle Security. Who grabbed Harry by the collar with one hand and tried to chuck him out the line. "Don' come back 'til you got some cloves' whot fit!"

Swinging by his collar, Harry ripped his wand from his trousers and jabbed the bouncer in the ribs. "_Imperio_! Now put me down and let me in, you twat!" The velvet rope moved and Harry bristled by, chucking a quick memory charm over his shoulder. _Desperate times, desperate measures…_ He coughed as he put his wand back in a discreet place.

The short corridor, that had one surly man yelling "don't touch my special place!" as Harry ran past, led towards the vibrations of the music was covering in strobe lights that sent epileptic rhythms through his heart.

Standing on the tip of his toes, Harry surveyed the mass of wiggling bodies with a sense of despair. There was no chance of spotting Draco, whose most distinctive feature in a crowd, would be drowned by the strobe lights that light up every follicle in the room like a fibre optic wig.

Harry clenched his wand tightly as he was jostled by a couple who had overbalanced in the act of snogging, presumably because their activity had left their middle ear with an oxygen deficiency.1 Jabbing them with his elbow, Harry muttered "Accio Draco!" He wasn't entirely sure if the spell would work on people, but he clenched his eyes and thought about blonde hair and morning breath, and inane fears of washing machines.

Harry smiled when he felt something familiar and silky press into his hands. Opening his eyes slowly, he expected to see Draco standing in front of him. Instead he saw the kissing couple using the nearest wall for balance. Looking down into his hand, he frowned at the fine strands of blonde hair weaved through his fingers.

"WEH-HEY!"

Harry looked over to the bar and saw a small clearing had appeared in the jeering crowd. Moving over, he saw a man sprawled on the floor, clutching his bloody nose and cursing as people pointed around him.

"Touch my hair again, I'll return the favour but I'll rip them from your balls instead!"

The man on the floor looked confused at what Draco was screaming, but all Harry cared about was that he had found his partner and it was time to make him leave before Lucius found them.

"Draco!"

Draco looked up whilst still rubbing his sore scalp, and smiled at Harry. Harry clenched his wand and fistful of hair; Draco was drunk. His smile was soppy and his eyes glazed, and he didn't seem at all surprised to see Harry standing there in his clothes. Draco moved forward, stepping nonchalantly over the Muggle he had just assaulted.

"Argh…Draco…Draco, stop! I cannot believe you're drunk on Muggle beer!" Cried Harry as Draco tried to stick his tongue down his throat.

"S'good, try some! You don't know what you're missing out on." Draco waved his hand and the barman, who Harry immediately disliked because he was baring an indecent amount of bicep to all blondes in the vicinity, placed a couple of golden coloured shots in front of them. Draco picked up the shot, and imparted wisdom on Harry. "Lick your skin and then put the salt on the bit you just licked, then you –"

"Tequila?!" Gasped Harry, immediately trying to wrestle the shot away from him, but Draco took Harry's action for a completely different gesture.

"Oh, if you like – Makes it more interesting, I suppose." And then Draco licked Harry's neck.

Somewhere between having his neck licked clean of salt, and then an hour later, finding himself grinding against Draco on the dance floor, Harry ingested an indecent quantity of tequila…including the worm from the litre bottle they had bribed from barman-with-interestingly-located-tattoo. Lucius had turned into an old worry niggling at the back of his mind, comparative to misplacing one's house keys, and he had forgotten about keeping to the safehouse and the war, because the lights were pretty and the vibrations from the speakers were knocking notes against his ribs like a xylophone.

In that moment, he didn't notice anything but the way Draco was nibbling his chin and dribbling alcohol into his stubble, rutting softly against him in a veiled production of dance and whispering all the sorts of things that he would never say to Harry when he was sober. ""You're shooo sexy, Po – Harry, and you haves nice eyes and I love you like a secret wank at work and I'm glad you don't have a hairy bum and…Psst, can I tell you a secret?"

"Yes."

"I like your hair."

Harry smiled and wrapped his arms around his partner, and didn't notice Lucius watching them carefully from the bar.

**

"Merry Christmas!" yelled Harry.

" 'Appy New Years!" and "Fuck off!" were the replies as the drunken masses fell out of the club into the early morning hours. The sun had not risen yet, but they all squinted at the shine from the street lamps, anticipating impending hangovers.

"I miss Venice." Stated Harry sedately, pressing his nose into the nape of Draco's neck as he leaned on the blonde for support, thinking about soft thighs and hip indents.

"We're not in Venice." Draco looked at the pavement, then around at the world in general. "Where do we live now?"

"Let's go back to Venice." Harry tried to place a kiss behind Draco's ear, to convince him of the carnal pleasures that would await on the Italian isle, but all he ended up with was a mouthful of hair. Blonde hair, shimmering in street light and three hours ago was an important message. "Draco, your Lucius is here…"

"Do we live here?" asked Draco, batting Harry's muffled mouth away from his head and pointing back inside the club questioningly.

**

Draco was wearing odd socks. One was yellow with pink squares, and the other one was plain green. Harry thought that the socks were a perfect representation of their relationship, and then thought that he was obviously still drunk if he was discovering cosmic meaning worn on Draco's feet.

"Cornflakes are evil." Draco poked a cornflake desolately with a spoon.

"Add milk then. Nothing softens evil up like diary." Said Harry. Such nuggets of wisdom should be cherished, thought Harry, pouring himself a glass of milk to sooth his own evil hangover. Draco disregarded his nugget.

"Dark Lord must be lactose intolerant. Can I borrow your glasses?"

"Why do you want my glasses?"

"I was going to transfigure them into sunglasses and hide my wasted beauty." Draco slouched into a dramatic pose. Harry reluctantly de-spectacled himself and handed his frames over to Draco, knowing that resistance would be futile.

Draco tapped the lenses with his wand, black smog crept through the particles of the glass. He shoved the shades on his nose and promptly groaned with relief. Harry took another sip of his milk and wondered if Draco's hands still had traces of his seed in the furrows of his fingerprints.

"IN MY OFFICE! NOW!"

Hermione flounced out as quickly as she had entered, apparently too caught up in a cloud of rage and her own fluffy hair to conduct a proper bollocking in the kitchen. Draco scooped a mouthful of dry cornflakes into his mouth and then dropped the spoon on the table. "Mission time!" He said cheerfully, standing up.

"I doubt it." Retorted Harry.

**

"You fools!"

Harry, who was holding the doorknob to the room they had just entered, pulled the door back a little to check the plaque on the outside; _, H.S.O._ Draco often said that these initials stood for Hairy Sea Otter, but Harry knew they stood for Head Surveillance Officer, which was definitely not who stood in front of them now. Draco was looking at him as if to make sure Harry sharing the same hallucination.

"Err…Granger, did you take that mouldy polyjuice the twins were cooking last week?"

"Mister Malfoy, your sarcasm is not appreciated. Do you have any idea what you two fools have done?" Snarled Snape.

"What are you doing here?" asked Draco. He suddenly smiled and Harry wanted to place a hand over his gleaming teeth so that Snape, vampire that he was, would not be blinded by the unusual exposure to shiny reflection of midmorning light. "Have you been discovered too? Are you going to stay here? You can have my room if you want, I'll share with Potter. How did you get discovered? Was it Mead Monday that loosened your tongue?"

"Mead Monday?" asked Harry, gripping the handle.

"Shut up." Snape stepped around Hermione's desk and pointed for them to sit before him on the low chairs that Hermione usually used to grind them into shameful lumps of shame. "Sit."

Moulding themselves into well known arse-grooves, they leaned back in the chairs, waiting to be berated for whatever stupidity that they had committed this time. Snape went back round the desk and placed a hand on the back of Hermione's chair and waited silently.

Harry looked to Draco. Draco was smiling invitingly at Snape. Snape was glaring at them both.

Well, he was glaring, but he also seemed to be waiting. Back straight, nose pompously erect, fingers drumming on the soft leather of the chair. Harry drummed his fingers too, hoping to make Draco direct that smile at him because the blonde clearly appreciated rhythm. Snape pinned him down with his gaze and Harry stilled his mocking digits, and waited.

**

"You are so stupid!" The door to the office burst open after twenty minutes of waiting, and Hermione's lips were blurred red. Harry would congratulate Ron later on getting some angry sex. Even sated, her rage still had flyaway split ends.

"You fools!" repeated Snape, Hermione nodded emphatically in agreement. Now that reprimanding reinforcements had arrived, Snape seemed happy to stop demonstrating the stealth of statues.

"What did we do?" asked Harry, wearily.

Snape scowled like he thought they were idiots. "You went partying last night." He stated.

Harry found it a little far stretched that a little dance and a lot of alcohol would prelude to such an ear bashing; maybe Draco had gained a signed permission slip to go out, and it was only Harry who was in trouble. "I didn't know I needed a permit!" he complained.

Hermione blinked at him and then restated what she thought of them. "You idiots!"

"I was called to a meeting early this morning. Lucius is ranting and raving about how he had seen – "

As soon as the name escaped Snape's lips, Harry felt something cold slide down his stomach, and it wasn't delayed digestion of the semen he'd taken a shot of last night.

"- And now the all the bloody Death Eaters are going to be roaming bloody Covent Gardens, looking for you two idiots! The only bloody reason you weren't killed on sight is because the Dark Lord wants bloody Potter for himself." Being insulted by Snape was like being insulted by a Seventeenth Century fop.

"What the hell were you thinking, going out, drinking when there is a killer on the loose!" Hermione cried, her hands clenched on the back of her chair, squeezing the leather in time with Snape's tapping.

Like two naughty children chastised for eating chalk, they scrunched down in their chairs, hoping to disappear from under the disapproving eye of Mummy-Beaver and Daddy-Greasy-Bucket. Harry cracked under the pressure and felt quite comfortable with letting Draco go down with the ship by himself.

"I only went to the club because I saw Lucius going in after him!" Explained Harry. Hermione and Snape both looked at him sternly, so he explained the previous night's events. Naturally he omitted the x-rated, insane reasons for being in Draco's room in the first place. When he finished explaining how he had seen two blondes slinking inside to have a rave, the only reply he was met with was Draco jabbing him in the ribs.

"Nice warning." Draco winked and made a rude motion with his hand that brought heat to Harry's cheeks and a special tingle in his lap.

"Shuddup."

"He's got a point Harry. You decided to get drunk instead. I know that coming back to England, you were hoping to experience the nightlife a little more, but you must be responsible! Honestly, you have the most famous Wizard in the world, and you think you can get away with walking about all willy-nilly –" Draco mouthed 'willy' to Harry, because he had the maturity of a twig. "- and not get recognised?" Hermione asked. Harry felt her question was rhetorical and said nothing. She huffed and placed her hands on her hips. "I'm placing you two under house arrest. Absolutely no leaving the safe house, even if it is on fire. Now hand over your wands."

"Hermione!"

"Hand them over!"

Harry handed his over begrudgingly. Being told off like a toddler by his best friend was God's way of telling him to catch up on the maturity level with the rest of his year. Draco handed his over with little fuss, not saying anything other than "How long are we under arrest?"

"Until you are needed for battle." Was her stern reply. She sent a sideways glance at Snape, and added, "Which I doubt will be far away. Dismissed."

**

Draco was quiet all the way up the stairs and to his bedroom, smiling vaguely like his hangover tasted of banana milkshake, and Harry felt he had to say something. "Alright, what gives? You don't seem bothered at all by this."

Draco allowed Harry to follow him into his bedroom, and he shut the door carefully after them. Walking over to the bed, he shoved his hand under his pillow and rooted around for something. Expecting to be confronted by a pair of sleeping-boxers, even though Harry knew that Draco liked Mother Nature's midnight hug on his skin, he was extremely surprised to have a wand brandished in his face.

Uncrossing his eyes, Harry looked down the line of the flesh wand to the aimer. Draco stood smirking, one eyebrow raised. Harry looked at the wand again, horror dawning. "That's a weapon of mass destruction!" he hissed.

Draco rolled his eyes. "Only in the wrong hands."

Harry thought about how ceiling paint soaked up blood rather well, and raised an eyebrow in return. Draco huffed.

Chucking the wand down casually on the bed, Draco took a decidedly firm step into Harry's personal bubble. Harry took a step back, because some blondes were crazy, and this one was known to bite. "House arrest. We could be locked away for weeks." Draco reached out and grabbed the zipper of Harry's flies, drawing him closer by the little piece of metal. "Whatever could we do to entertain ourselves."

Harry felt that this was a rhetorical question too, and so said nothing. Also, his mouth was dry.

**

Tbc

1 When you have no oxygen, the fluid in the middle ear, that is responsible for balance, becomes pressurised and leads to dizziness. Hence why they have bumped into Harry. -- My little bit of sceience! Woop for me! Sorry it was late guys


	15. Chapter 15

**Chapter Fifteen**

Harry laid on his side, one leg stretched out along the mattress and the other bent at the knee. Draco's leg was slung over Harry's raised thigh, his back spooned into Harry's chest like symmetrical cutlery, pushing his skin against Harry's with every intake of breath.

It had been six days since their house arrest was declared, and their time had been spent lucratively; from when the sun reached its highest and lowest points in the sky, Draco would sit watching the crowds with his binoculars while Harry lounged about the room surrounded by newspapers. When the sun finally dipped below the tilted tops of Covent Garden, they would strip and spend the rest of their conscious time slowly pinching and arching and licking and sucking. If a murder was to be committed in the morning, neither of them were on watch, preferring to spend the time huddled under the covers, imitating nocturnal sex-mad rabbits.

Harry rested his head on one hand, looking down at Draco's face, watching as a strand of blond hair levitated above those perfect lips before being sucked back against them.

"Pah…" Draco huffed the strand out of the way and tried to speak again. "Potter, add another one."

Harry pressed a second finger against the small stretched opening, rubbing the pad along the sensitive crinkled skin. Draco's balls twitched under the heel of his palm in anticipation as he reached between the man's legs. "Say my name. My proper name."

"Dickhead." Harry withdrew a finger, leaving Draco stubbornly clenching onto a single digit. "Put it back!" Draco turned his head to angle his face to Harry's, and Harry wanted to kiss him. Instead he just smiled benevolently down at those kissable, scowling features. "Fine, fine. Whatever. Kindly add three fingers into my arse or I'm going to shove my wand up your left nostril…please. Harry."

"Was that so hard?" asked Harry smugly, complying.

Draco didn't seem to dignify that with a response, but his lips formed a little O of pleasure and that pesky strand of hair fell back in front of his lips as he pushed his forehead against the mattress. Harry couldn't resist then and leaned down, placing a kiss, that strand tasting like dull hair against his tongue.

"I think," whispered Harry, "that you're perfect." Draco didn't reply because he was too busy being a slut to Harry's right hand, but he arced his shoulders into Harry's nipples, and that was enough of a response. "Are you ready?"

"Yes."

"Alright." Harry was very gratified with the noise Draco made. Not unlike the sound of a bottle being uncorked. Reaching down between them, Harry grabbed his cock and shuffled his lower half closer. Aiming blindly, he finally felt a depression in the smooth skin rolling against the weeping head of his dick, and pushed forward.

Draco had a filthy mouth. He articulated no words, but a blather of moans that Harry would have considered indecent if he wasn't so distracted by the feel of his cock pressing past the tight ring of muscle. Thinking that he had rendered his partner speechless with the power of his almighty manhood, Harry was about to thrust to the hilt to make the other man dumb, he almost jumped his way up inside Draco's colon in shock when Draco suddenly yelped. "Don't go any further! Pull out."

"What? Are you okay? Oh my god, am I hurting you?" Harry hoisted himself up a little to look down the length of their bodies and down between the vee of Draco's legs. Pulling his hips back until he slipped out of Draco's body, Harry inspected his penis for blood, wondering if he had seriously overestimated the sexual prowess of the Slytherin house.

Something sharp poked him in the stomach, and Harry looked up from his jewels to see Draco looking at him cynically. "What are you doing, you dolt?"

"You told me to pull out!"

"Yeah, so you could put it back."

Harry felt his brow lower, because Draco Malfoy was mental and made no sense. "…I thought I'd hurt you."

Draco raised his eyebrow. "Do I look like a virgin to you?"

"…no."

"Then what's the problem? Now, put it back."

Harry, still slightly confused about what had just happened, moved back. Just as he realigned himself and slid that first crucial inch inside, the horridly wonderful feeling of tightness clenching about him, Draco's hand landed on his hip, and pushed him away. As quickly as possible, pressing a comforting finger over the bruise that Justin's luggage had marred Draco's silky skin on their arrival, Harry pulled out again. The slight 'pop' made his cheeks feel hot. "Are you okay?"

"Why do you keep asking that?" Draco's hand was now _pulling_ his hips. Not replying, Harry cautiously pushed forward. He missed the first time, the head of his cock tapping the back of Draco's balls, but after a little bit of wiggling, he managed to settling himself back inside for the first inch or so before Draco began protesting again.

Harry out again, but this time didn't move far away. He looked down at Draco's face, studying it intently. Draco wasn't making eye contact, a slight pink tinge on his cheeks that could have been from embarrassment if Malfoys were inclined to feel such a thing. Draco's hand clenched on his hip but he was still calculating the thread count of the sheets.

Harry pressed forward experimentally, entering just far enough for the tight circle of muscle to clench under the head of his penis, and then he pulled back out. Draco tipped his head back, eyes closed, biting his bottom lip, and looked for all the world like he was waiting intently for something. Harry drove forward again, then pulled back just as quickly and Draco leaned up for a kiss.

"You retard. Why can't you do anything the normal way?" asked Harry.

"Shuddup." Draco's cheeks were still pink.

xxx

"Draco…"

"Yesss…."

"I'm sore."

"Please Harry…"

Harry's heart seized at the sound of his name and he sighed. Sneaky bastard.

xxx

"Again!"

"No, I can't…I'm so sore!"

"Harry!"

"Surely its lunch time…"

"Let's skip lunch."

"And keep doing this? Please, have mercy!"

"But it feels soooo good. It's hot."

"Yeah, so are the friction burns I'm getting."

"Harry." Harry sighed, because Draco's pout was more powerful than the stinging sensation in his privates.

xxx

Draco was giving him the silent treatment. Harry was fine with this, because he was too busy pressing frozen peas about his crotch. The tip of his foreskin had not stopped tingling since he'd put his boxers back on, and the feeling of hot liquid pouring down his urethra left him worried that he was never going to be able to get another erection.

"You crippled me!" hissed Harry, moving the peas and turning the page of the text book in front of him.

"Pussy." This was the only reply Harry had gotten since he'd admitted to surrender over an hour ago.

"I'm probably psychologically impotent now!" accused Harry.

"Wimp."

"What we just did was sexual conditioning, I'm never going near you again unless you're clothed!"

Draco lobbed a quill at Harry. "What happened to Gryffindor stamina?"

"An hour and a half, Malfoy!" growled Harry. "Do you really like the feel of penetration _that_ much?!"

Malfoy flushed and this time Harry didn't want to lick, kiss or anything him. Frankly, he felt nothing sexual about Draco at all now.

"We all have our little kinks." Stated Draco, standing up to fetch the quill that had rebounded off Harry's head. Harry winced as Draco bent down to pick it up, the sight made his balls prickle with interest and his nerve ending protest just at the prospect. He'd not even managed more than two inches inside his partner throughout the whole time. The selfish bastard.

"I wish you were straight." lied Harry.

"Really?" Draco's voiced wavered. A tiny part of Harry's brain, the bruised one in his trousers, thought '_lick him!'_

"No. But I think you need to go back to counselling."

"Ssh! Merlin's sake, this is a library."

Harry and Draco both turned to glare at Jeff, who looked a little green. Served him right for bloody eavesdropping.

xxx

The newspaper dropped down into Harry's mashed potato with a loud squelch, and Hermione crossed her arms angrily. Extracting the Daily Mail from his carbohydrates, Harry looked at the front page and felt sick.

She was a young girl, and the blank stare of her sprawled figure across from the pavement was relentless.

"That's your fault." Said Hermione.

"I went to visit my mother today, but I've completely forgotten were we lived. Clearly I've been abroad too long." Tonks said. Draco patted her arm sympathetically and was about to reply.

Harry threw the paper at him. It slid across the table, knocking over Draco's teacup and spilling the insides over the starched photograph. Draco looked down at the picture for a long moment, and then righted his cup. Nonchalantly, he refilled it.

Harry excused himself from dinner and went to the library. He'd lost sight of the big picture. Her name was Stacy and she had been nine years old. Nine.

Ten minutes later, a plate of cold mashed potatoes and beef was set down at his elbow as he thumbed through location maps. Harry watched Draco settle down in the chair opposite and picked up a map. As Draco circled a possible location for Voldemort's hideout and scribbled down a note, Harry took a bite of beef.

"Thank you."

"Don't eat with your fingers."

xxx

The following days were mostly uneventful. They had poured over maps and exchanged several owls with Professor Snape, who revealed nothing insightful, but the research on Voldemort's location had been fruitless. Naturally hiding under Fidelius, they had little hope of doing anything.

The safe house was mostly empty during the day, everyone but Harry and Draco sent out for reconnaissance, and then they all trailed into the dining room looking grey and sickly at sundown, seeking nutrition and a few hours of sleep before heading out again in the morning. London had never seemed so large until they were looking for a wooden needle in a metropolitan haystack.

Draco seemed particularly frustrated. When he wasn't getting carpet burns in front of Harry's spread legs, he would sit at the window of his bedroom, binoculars digging into his cheekbones, hopelessly looking for any sign of magic on the streets below.

xxx

Harry knocked on the door. A grunt sounded through the wood and he took that as permission to open it. "Hi."

"What's up?"

"I'm going for a shower." Said Harry.

Draco hadn't turned around or lowered the binoculars. "Alright."

"Do you…" Harry felt hot as he looked at the stack of murder reports by Draco's feet. "…Do you wanna have a break? Come join me?"

"No thanks." Draco lowered the lenses and looked over Harry's shoulder. He had ringed impressions about his eyes. He smiled sedately. "When it gets too dark to use these," he jiggled the apparatus in his hand, "then you should come here. Spend the night, yeah?"

"Okay."

Harry felt almost pacified as he watched Draco turn obsessively back to the window. Turning, Harry went to have a shower.

xxx

"I'm still sore, you bloody menace." Said Harry. To an empty room. Frowning, Harry turned and went to look for Draco downstairs. He looked in the library, in the kitchen, in Hermione's office, in his own room, in Justin's room, even in Jeff's room. He'd tried the second floor bathroom, and whilst it was occupied, he assumed it wasn't Draco, who showered habitually in the mornings. Returning to Draco's room, Harry wondered over to the binoculars and looked out onto the streets. It had worked once, surely it would work again.

Harry stood for a good ten minutes, enhanced vision running over the crowds and bustle of Covent Garden. Whilst Draco could sit for hours doing this, because he obsessed over things like a dog with a bone, Harry had little patience. Disappointedly, Harry dropped the binoculars on the chair and walked over to the bed. He climbed under the covers and waited, the sun shining across his face as it began to dip towards the horizon.

xxx

The rain poured down on both their heads and Draco briefly wondered if his father even knew what an umbrella was, because even though his own hair plastered artistically against his damp cheekbones, Lucius' hair looked like rat tails. "I should have had you drowned at birth."

"Nice to see you too."

"So this is where you have come. Disgrace your family and turn your lot over to the Mudbloods and traitors." Lucius sniffed and the stray drop of water that hung on the tip of his nose vanished elegantly up one nostril. Draco wanted to giggle, but settled for a sardonic smirk.

"They have better dental."

"What about Potter?" asked Lucius.

"What about him?"

"Well, I've heard reports. You're partners. I'm surprise they even trust you enough to let you out from under their eye."

"Hmm." _I bet you pissed your breeches when you found out, you stupid old fool_.

"Whoring yourself to half bloods and traitors. Look at what you have reduced yourself to."

Draco ignored his father's tutting, because a man who killed people for taint of their blood could hardly hold any moral high ground. That and Draco had never received that pony for his birthday when he was nine. "Potter is a better fuck than McNair."

Lucius hissed. "Draco, don't be so crass…Come back with me, son. Come back to the family, come back with me."

He looked pathetically Muggle. Standing in a puddle among the drenched cobblestones of London, his long cloak could easily have been overlooked as an anorak by equally wet Muggle scum. Hair clumping together and an undernourished face beseechingly looking at him. Draco wanted to laugh at his good fortune.

"Where are you? Surely not at the manor."

"With family. Where you should be." Lucius held his hand out. His upturned palm filled with droplets and pooled along the indent of his short lifeline.

"Sometimes family is overrated."

"Draco, if you walk away now –"

"Return? Come back to the Dark Lord? He'll forgive me, right?" Draco snorted and thought of Harry's shower warm skin waiting for him when he got back. "Keep your promises to yourself, old man."

"If you walk away, I'll kill you the next time I see you. Son or not."

"Thanks for the heads up. Goodbye, father."

xxx

"Potter, move over."

"Nong rocket jam…" Harry spat out the pillow and shuffled over as he felt the corner of the bed covers lift. Cold air pressed into his sleep warm skin, sending a rush of goosebumps over his flesh. "Nooo….cold!"

"Move over some more. How anorexic do you think I am?"

Harry moved over more, ever so reluctant to leave his warm spot. However, the hot body that pressed up against him was fair compensation.

"Where were you?" Murmured Harry.

"In the shower."

"Okay. We sleeping now?" His head was too fuzzy to pick up the lie in Draco's voice.

"Yeah, go to sleep."

Tangled around one another, dozy and comfortable, just as Harry was drifting off to sleep, he felt Draco's chest vibrate as he spoke. "Remind me to tell you where Voldemort is in the morning."

A soft snore fell from Harry's mouth in reply.

xxx

**TBC**


	16. Chapter 16

**Chapter Sixteen**

"I don't want to do this."

"If you don't do this, then you shall lose all my respect," said Draco gravely.

"You don't respect me anyway."

"…I won't do that thing with my tongue anymore." Draco replied, his tone even more grave as if such an idea would coerce Harry into doing such an unpleasant task.

Harry knocked on the door, because that thing that Draco did with his tongue felt good going clockwise or anti-clockwise. They stood at the door, waiting for an answer, childishly jabbing each other with their elbows because they had a lower mentality than Professor Lockhart. After a particular jab to his ribs, Harry grabbed Draco's elbow and pinched the skin on the inside of the joint. Draco's eyes were clenched shut in a wince of pain, and Harry was leaning forward to capture the expression for when he next felt lonely.

The door opened and Justin sneered at them. Harry jerked his face away from Draco's, and gave one final squeeze of the soft skin between his thumb and index finger. Draco jabbed him, and Harry reciprocated. Justin coughed loudly.

"Right…er…hi." Harry said. Justin didn't look impressed.

Draco gave a wide smile and lewdly said, "Well, I'll just leave you crazy kids alone then. Have fun."

They both watched the Slytherin swagger off down the corridor, rubbing his arm, and then turned to one another. "What do you want?" asked Justin.

_Be sexy. I know it is hard for you, Potter, what with being a social retard. Just try to emulate me._

Harry had replied to such advice earlier in the day with an extremely appropriate remark that had made the ends of Draco's toes curl. Now, facing his ex-Hufflepuff, Harry almost felt inclined to follow the advice.

Slipping on finger into the belt loop of his jeans and cocking his head to one side, he smirked widely and did a little complicated wiggle with his eyebrow that he hoped signalled come-hither. Justin sneered and went to shut the door.

"NO!" Harry's foot was struck with the door as he placed it in the jam. Justin scowled even deeper, if possible, and Harry wondered if his eyebrows were going to set up shop on his chin. "Sorry, right. Well, I came to ask you something. You know, a question."

"What do you want?" repeated Justin.

_How do I approach the subject?_ Harry had asked.

_Just ask him for his big, hard thing_, Draco had replied.

"Can I have your hard thing?" asked Harry. Justin's eyebrows shot in the other direction, and when he cast his eye after Draco's exit, Harry felt heat burn up in his face. Which was ridiculous because one shouldn't blush in front of people who have already seen you naked. "Err, I mean to say –"

"You'd best come in."

Justin's room was thrift bare like all the other rooms in the safe house, and other than a pair of orange striped boxers flung over one bedpost, the room was overly generic, devoid of any personal affects. Harry had the same standard bed sheets in his room, not that he really noticed as Narcissa had give Draco special Egyptian cotton ones – much nicer. And they were grey, exactly a different shade from Draco's eyes.

"Do do you remember when we came to England?"

"Yes…" Justin sat on the edge of the bed but didn't pat the mattress invitingly, just blinked up at Harry suspiciously as he drew his word out low and long.

"Right, so you know that was when me and…er…another blond got together?" Harry felt it was better not to mention Draco's name on his ex's turf; Just bad manners and Aunt Petunia had beaten him better than that. However, from the look on Justin's face, blinking up at him slowly as if appearing to find Harry's manners somewhat lacking, maybe Harry's context wasn't needed. Clearing his throat, he continued bravely. "Right, well…when we landed in England, your luggage –"

"This is about my luggage?" interrupted Justin, his scowl becoming more pronounced. "I thought you were here to apologise."

"For what?!" yelped Harry.

_Don't get angry. Silence is the best annoyance._ Draco's words were full of profound wisdom, for many a time had Harry wanted to strangle his partner in an argument when his opponent responded with only witty silence. It was good advice, but Justin's next words made it hard to follow.

"For being a total slut and shagging that peroxide prat while you were with me," stated Justin. Harry thought about Justin's place in his life before he began going out with Draco, trying to remember something redeeming about the man other than his similar physical qualities to other people. He found it hard to produce a memory, but found it easy enough to formulate a reply.

"You're insane." Harry huffed. "I didn't cheat on you. We'd already broke up before I started with Dra – my other blond. Natural Blond, by the way."

"Pfft!"

"Pfft?" Harry folded his arms across his chest. "Are you saying you don't believe me?"

"I saw the way you looked at him. Parking your dick wherever you ca –"

"I have a very stressful job, I need every bit of relief I can get and I didn't cheat on you!"

"Liar!"

Harry felt the capillaries in his cheeks fill like unwelcomed morning wood, and wanted to storm out of the room. Unfortunately, he had a job to do. Huffing, and deciding that dirty blond men can believe what they want because they clearly don't have two brain cells to bash together, ground out "Shut up. I didn't cheat. Just let me borrow your penseive and then I can stop having to have this stupid conversation. No matter what I say you'll say I'm lying. You're always like that. Paranoid."

Justin had his mouth open, about to make a cutting remark, but sort of blinked in mid motion. Closing his mouth and trying to look more composed than a scorned lover, Justin gulped loudly and said lowly, "I don't have one."

Harry took a step across the room until his knees touched Justin's and leaned down, hissing. "Liar."

xxx

"So, what did you have to do for it?" asked Draco, leaning back smugly against the headboard of his bed as Harry lugged the heavy pensieve into the room. They all knew the laws on owning one of these, and Harry would bet Ron's treasured chessboard that Justin didn't have a license.

Dropping the carved boulder on the end of the bed and slamming the door shut, Harry tried to sound blasé. "Oh, you know, this and that. A rimjob here, a quick fuck there. That's all."

Draco would bristle, and stalk across the room, claim his lips in a possessive, snarling kiss and shove him to the floor and lust the living daylights out of him. It would be hot and it would be sweaty and there would be bondage and words of 'mine' over and over and -

"Make sure to brush your teeth before coming near me. I don't like the taste of badger." Harry felt a little deflated as he watched Draco lean forward and run his fingers reverently over the runes clawed into the side of the stone.

"You know, fucking him again reminds me of the good old times."

"Oh?" Draco ran his finger over a rune that looked to be a squiggle drawn by a three year old.

"Yeah. I miss the things he does with his, err, nipples and stuff – in fact," Harry began to feel inventive, "I think that it is something to do with the Huffle-gene. Makes them ultra dynamite in bed, all, err, hot and squirmy and –"

"Even if you have bent over and let him ram it through to your tonsils, I still wouldn't have cared less," stated Draco. He finally looked up, and seemed to have read Harry's expression of absolute discontent, and added in a dry voice, "However, if you want me to pretend to be jealous, then that's fine. But do you want me to show you my memory which will save the world before or after I remind you who has the hottest arse around?"

"After!" It didn't take Harry long to contemplate an answer.

Draco snorted as he approached. "Some saviour you are."

xxx

"Do you think I look like a frog stuck on its back like this?" asked Draco. Harry had to stop his movements for a moment to consider this image. The question had taken him by surprise and frankly he wondered if he was doing something wrong because the only sound Draco should have rightly been able to make were moans and two syllables; Haaaa-rreeee!

"I wouldn't do this to a frog." Replied Harry, giving what he hoped to be a boyish grin.

"I know, but I was just thinking, if there was a mirror on the ceiling, then I would surely see how bad I look in this position. My friend made a porn picture of himself once, and said that whilst he thought he was posing well during the flash, the end copy just made him look like a beached whale trying to make love to a mattress with a woman somewhere vaguely in between."

Harry didn't want to ask, because he was sure his erection would wither. "Was it Goyle?"

"Huh? Oh, no." Draco comforted, his legs spread wide enough to dislocate a hip as he laid on his back, waiting for Harry to enter him. "It was McNair."

"…Let's look at the memory first instead."

xxx

It was raining. This was the first thing that Harry noticed, not that it was anything note worthy, for rain in England was just a background noise to everyday life. The pitter-patter of the droplets that were usually present against the path was conspicuously missing because of the crisp white snow that covered every surface in the entire street. The perpetual English rain would wash away the abnormality that was snow, and Harry thought that was a shame for the little children he could see throwing snowballs at one another in Hyde Park, which was visible at the submerged T-junction at the end of the road.

"Come along, Draco. Put that down." Lucius' hair was shorter, cropped about his jaw line, and Harry was uncomfortably aware that a few inches here and there and he would be practically bonking his enemy's carbon copy.

Dropping the handful of car-worn brown snow on the ground, Draco ran to catch up to his parents that were striding ahead without consideration for their son's shorter legs. "Wait, wait!" Neither of them slowed down, but when their son reached them, huffing and red in the face, he jabbed them with his fist in the back of the knees. "You could have waited!"

Lucius casually reached out and clipped his son upside the head for punching him, but other than the brief _smack_ that echoed the street and sent the little boy tripping, he didn't acknowledge anything.

"I was such a lovely child," sighed Draco wistfully, staring at himself with more love than a cup of coffee. "So blonde, so good natured, so well bred, so amazingly be -"

"Bratty."

Draco huffed and set off to follow his younger self down the street. Harry followed as well, because sometimes he couldn't help himself. Lions were curious animals, he had read it once in Mrs Figg's Reader's Digest.

"Do you remember the number, dear?" asked Narcissa. She was dressed in red. She looked sexy and anaemic.

"Thirty one."

"Daddy!...Father?"

"What?"

"Is the chicken-nosed girl going to be there? I don't like her, can't we spend Christmas with Pansy?"

Harry looked at his boyfriend questioningly, but Draco seemed too interested in rubbing raindrops into the dip of his belly button. Harry wished they had gotten dressed first before entering the memory.

"Don't call her that to her face, Draco. Mind your manners," replied Narcissa, turning and walking up a couple of steps to a low light porch. The mistletoe that hung above the door knocker was beginning to wilt.

The two Malfoy males joined Narcissa on the doorstep, and stood waiting for someone to receive them. Harry watched Lucius look out the corner of his eye to inspect his son's attire before releasing another loud _smack_ to the fluffy blonde head. "Straighten your tie, boy!"

As the impact of flesh on flesh stopped resounding about the street, the world went dark.

xxx

"Did he slap you often?" asked Harry as they fell out of the pensieve.

"I think you are missing point of this little trip down memory lane," replied Draco. Shimming out of his boxers, Draco repositioned himself on the bed, spread and greedy. It made Harry want to confess to batrachophilia instead of going out and saving the world.

Harry looked at his abandoned trousers resentfully and bit the inside of his cheek to stop himself from doing dirty things with his lips. "…Get dressed and find Tonks."

"No sex?" smirked Draco, wiggle his hips to make his erection paint arcs below his bellybutton. Harry demonstratively began pulling on his own clothes, tucking his belligerent penis back in its mouse hole and zipping up his flies carefully. Draco pouted. Harry did up the button on his chastity-trousers.

"We've got to save the world."

"Fine. But if I die, then I want you to die too. Can ghosts have sex?"

"Just. Get. Changed!" gritted out Harry, he thought his teeth were going to break from the temptation of it all. Draco huffed but sat up, and Harry drew in a sigh of relief.

Draco's pert bottom was wriggling high in the air when Harry emerged from pulling his jumper over his head. He was about to lecture certain blondes on the time and the place for buggery when the world was in peril, then he noticed that such a blatant display was not becoming of a subtle Slytherin, and that Draco was actually rummaging around in the bed covers and under the pillows.

"Your shirt is over there." Harry pointed.

"I'm not looking for my clothes."

"Well I wouldn't recommend going into battle el natural."

"I'd probably win that way," replied Draco. One pillow went onto the floor, followed by three more and then to horror, Frankenbird.

"Was he there all this time? We could have squashed him!"

"If he can survived being hand luggage from Italy, then I'm sure he'd survive bouncy sex."

Harry watched the mutant pigeon sprint across the floorboards and made a statement for the record least he came back one day to find Draco dressed as Big Bird. "I don't find feathers attractive."

"That's good, because I'm glad you know that even though it looks like a turkey baster, you shouldn't pummel the poultry." Draco continued rummaging for a moment or two, delectable arse waving about invitingly, and finally gave a loud 'ah-ha!' and chucked something at Harry.

Harry caught the object reflexively, like a snitch on a summer's breeze, and unfurled his palm curiously. The wand was thicker than his own and the wood was damp and sticky. Realising what he was holding, Harry thought about the core and wondered whether he would ever get the blood off his hands. But then, thinking metaphorically, they were already dripping wet. "Can't I just use my own wand?" asked Harry. "I bet I can't even cast a simple lumos with this thi –" As he said the words, the tip of the wand began to burn, brilliant white light that hurt his retinas. '_Nox'_ he thought numbly, and the light extinguished obediently at the suggestion of his mind. "Oh wow…" He looked at the weapon for a moment before flinging it back at Draco, horrified.

"Don't be a wuss." Draco picked up the wand and twirled it neatly, wielding the power without respect for its potential destructiveness. "You're going to need it."

"Who says I do?"

"We can't knock on SnakeFace's door and expect him to invite us in for tea." Draco held the wand out invitingly. "Besides, his tea tastes like cardboard. Something I made a note of mentioning in my resignation letter."

Harry quirked a smile but it didn't stop the unease he felt at seeing the flesh wand in his partner's hands. "You didn't resign," Harry reminded him.

Draco ignored that, for in his mind he was a super-spy and would never have gotten caught. "Dear Lord Where-has-your-nose-gone, I am writing to tell you about the substandard beverages in the staff canteen. The decaff coffee has too much caffeine and Dolohov has taken to writing bad poetry in acrylics on the side of all the cups and clicking his fingers when he approves of something. I myself have found the tea to be like water and I am suspicious of the teabags because they don't have PG Tips printed anywhere on them. Also, every time I drink them, I get worrying menstrual cramps. Therefore, I am resigning for my own health. Please forward all future pay packages to my bank account. Thank you. Yours, Draco Lucius Malfoy." Draco gave a wide smile and added solemnly, "Pee, esss. I find torturing Muggles boring."

"You were caught because you are a sucky spy," said Harry before Draco began redrafting his resignation.

Draco huffed and pulled on his trousers, tucking the flesh wand into the dip of his left hip bone. Tugging on a t-shirt with the words 'Harry Potter's Maverick', made by Hermione as reward for doing well in the arrest of certain female therapists, Draco headed out the door.

Stumbling after him, they walked down the mental ward and knocked on the last door on the right. No answer came. Even after Draco kicked the door frame and hopped about a bit in pain.

"Do you think it's because she's on patrol?" asked Harry, resenting their house arrest with renewed vigour.

"No, I don't think so. This way."

Harry followed Draco up a flight of stairs to his own landing but they walked past his bedroom door, which seemed familiarly alien to him from disuse. Drawing up short on the door next to his room, Draco knocked. Harry felt the confusion fall over his face. "But isn't this…"

The door opened and Robert stepped out looking strangely ruffled for the time of day, his hair competing with Harry's for disarray and his bathrobe askew.

"Hello Jeff, you look dashing," smiled Draco professionally polite, "Any chance we could borrow Nymphadora for a moment please?"

xxx

**TBC**

**A/N: **Points to those who didn't have to look up batrachophilia


	17. Chapter 17

**Chapter Seventeen**

"Are you calling my mother a terrorist?" Her nose was morphed into an upturned point and her hair was bright red, whether from embarrassed disgruntlement or anger, Harry was unsure. Tonks was clutching the towel tightly about her body, her slim figure outlined by the cotton, her wide hips but small breasts were the subject of much scrutiny as Draco babbled an explanation in the background.

"... – I'm not calling her a terrorist, but she is housing a dark lord in her guest room!"

"And what evidence do you have to back up this bloody theory then, eh?" hissed Tonks. She looked smug, as if expecting Draco to have pulled the concept out of thin air. Her flat chest heaved and pressed against the edge towel, then deflating quickly in barely suppressed rage. Jeff was standing behind her, overshadowed by the doorframe, but still seemed impressively shagged in the background, offering moral support.

Draco, just as smugly, replied. "I had a lovely little chat with my father yesterday. He asked me to go back to the dark side and to family who love me. He informed me himself that he was staying in London, and while no Malfoy has property in London because the Grimmauld estate was entailed to Potter here, we do have some family left. You are my only family that resides in England."

Tonks seemed to have remembered that she was arguing with the person who had managed to unveil a tea conspiracy, and pulled a face. However, she was not to be put off. "That sounds too random. Lucius could be in a hotel somewhere."

"No, he specifically said with family." Draco raised his hand suddenly and dramatically pointed a finger in Tonks' face, whose nose became even more turned up to avoid being hit. "You said the other day that you couldn't remember where your mother lived. How unlikely is that? You have lived there your whole childhood and you have only been abroad in the last year and a half."

"I…err…" Tonks stuttered. It did seem unlikely. Harry watched her towel gain slack as she deflated in doubt. "Well I'm sure if I think hard then…"

"Or!" interrupted Draco, smiling, "Your mother's house is currently suffering an infestation of paranoid Death Eaters, who use Fidelius on any of their locations. You might have been oblivated too at some point, just to cover their tracks."

"And you think my mum is in on it?" asked Tonks defensively. She sent a look in Harry's direction, but when she found his gaze misplaced, she bristled. Harry was shocked himself, because one moment he was pleasantly noting how her flat chest was, and then next two large fleshy balloons inflated beneath the towel. Flushing, he raised his eyes to meet her glare, and then turned his head away and let out one short whistle of innocence.

"Oh no." placated Draco. "I think my father tricked her. Maybe laid on a bit of the Malfoy-charm –" At this point, Draco struck a pose and the material over his flat, wonderfully male chest pulled taunt and suggesting for Harry to sample a lick. "- and overpowered her. It would have been easy."

Harry looked away to Robert. The man was of little consequence to him these days. No longer a suspect of his partner's beverage larceny, in Harry's mind, his insignificance to Draco had limited to merely the label of 'Tonks' surprising new shag' in Harry's head.

"Look," sighed Draco, his impatience thin in his voice. "All I need you to do is send a little to your mother asking for the address. Just say you can't remember because you got hit by a stray obliviate in training or something. If she is innocent, then she has nothing to fear from sending you the reply."

Tonks rolled the words over in her head before giving a tense nod. Ten minutes late, the letter was composed and flying away on the wings of a barn owl. It was a mere twenty minutes by road from Covent Garden to Hyde Park, but by owl it would be even quicker and so Draco suggested imposing on Robert's person space for ten minutes to await the reply; "Don't mind, do you, Jeff?"

They sat on the rumpled bedcovers, Robert sitting uncomfortably at the desk while Draco and Tonks argued over Andromeda's status; hostage or citizen-spy? Harry stood by the window, waiting for a more majestic bird among the pigeons.

"I'm coming with you," said Tonks stubbornly. No one protested. She stood up and reached for the tie of her bed robe. Robert coughed, and Draco glared at him for interrupting. "Oh don't worry, they're gay."

"Yes, very gay. So please don't show me your wibbly bits." Harry said, his eyes averted. He felt Draco shift restlessly across the room.

"Malfoy is not," stated Robert. Harry wondered whether Jeff was only a shag.

"I'll have you know that I am so!" squeaked Draco resentfully. "Ask Potter. Potter, aren't I gay? Tell Tonky that I'm gay, and then she can get her 'wibbly bits' out for me."

Tonks sent Draco a look as she let the bathrobe drop. Draco's face lit up with delight as the material hit the floor, and Harry wanted to bit the bastard for running his eyes _ever so _slowly up the Metamorphmagus's body. "That's not fair," pouted Draco.

Her body was like a Barbie doll. Devoid of any genitalia except for two full lumps of fat on her ribcage that posed as breasts, but without the nipples, they merely looked like an odd pocket of fluid rolling under the skin. She had done well, catering to all of their disgust as she moved to her strewed clothes without humility.

She pulled her clothes on smugly.

**

The letter had been sent back. Obviously opened and read, but no reply was scrawling in the margins, no address written on the back in compliment to Tonks' untidy chicken scrawl.

They'd immediately Apparated to Hyde Park and began searching about the streets until they finally found a slither of familiarity from Draco's memory. As he stood there in the snowless road, looking out between the row of houses towards Hyde Park where business men sat tentatively on the grass in their lunch hour, Harry had never felt so frustrated in all his life. Voldemort was within a hundred yards of him, and the words of the past haunted him; _'You-Know-Who could search the village where Lily and James were staying for years and never find them, not even if he had his nose pressed against their sitting room window!"_

"Fuck sakes!" yelled Draco, a few yards away, inspecting the seams on the terrace houses. Storming over to Harry, Draco dropped down on the curb and sat pensively. "We need to figure out who the secret keeper is."

"Well…" Harry sat down on the curb and watched Tonks squint at the brickwork around the water drain of number thirty. "Wouldn't it be Voldemort?"

"No." Sighed Draco. "He _is_ the secret, so he can't be the keeper."

"Why not?"

"The spell wrapped around the bond of trust between people. For example, why didn't your parents become their own secret keepers of Godric Hallow?"

"Err…" Harry frowned. It seemed such a simple question. A horridly simple question and it made him want to cry. If such a thing was possible, then Wormtail's betrayal could have been avoided, his parents could be alive. "I don't know. Why can't they?"

"Because it is too predictable," replied Draco.

"…eh?"

"Alright, imagine this." Draco shifted to sit sideways on the curb and pressed his knee into Harry's thigh, he began making shapes with his hands as he explained the scenario. "What if your dear old dad had to go and get some milk? Can't have tea without milk, right? So, he's popped down to the shop, and who does he happen to meet there? Voldemort. What stops Voldemort from feeding him Veritaserum and getting him divulge where his dear wife and son are hiding?" Draco gave a very sympathetic smile and it warped his eyebrows. "Therefore, as added protection, you make someone else the keeper. So that those who are searching for you have the added difficulty of figuring out who the keeper is, that's how the spell is designed."

"Oh, right. So then do you think it would be your dad?" Harry looked down at where Draco's knee pressed into the denim of his trousers, warm through the layers.

"He's the one who told them where my mum lives, it's got to be him!" Tonks flopped down on the floor too, her eyes suspiciously red. She looked stressed.

Draco looked skywards out the corner of his eye for a moment, and then slowly shook his head. "No. I don't think it could be him."

"Why not?" asked Harry.

Draco bit his lip, and Harry wanted to kiss him and have Draco tell him that the events of the past were unavoidable. That parents don't die and leave their children because the spell protecting them was flawed.

"Because trust is relative," Draco said. When he was met with two confused gazes, he continued. "Your parents trusted Wormtail, believing him to be their loyal friend after so many years of companionship. They died from this misjudgement. Black trusted Dumbledore to hide him, because he believed Dumbledore to be a great man that no one could pry the secret out of…but who would the Dark Lord put his trust in?"

Harry was at a blank. He looked at Tonks and she seemed no better with the riddle.

"I can't think of anyone," Tonks said aloud.

"Me neither," Draco said, "That's the point. It could be anyone."

Putting it that way, the improbability of finding the secret keeper was too much. Harry raised his knees and folded his arms across the top of them, dipping his head down and taking some deep breaths. Faces and names ran through his head, but each person his mind lingered upon, the question mark remained over every possibility.

Distantly he heard sniffling and knew that if he looked up from the crook of his arms, he would see the tears sliding down Tonks' face. Harry bit back bile.

"I'm a genius."

Harry looked up to first see Tonks' stunned wet face, and then Draco's shining grin.

"You are?" asked Harry.

"Oh yes." Draco stood up and pointed down at Tonks. "Send a patronus to your mother, telling her you are in the street but you can't remember what house it is. Say it is urgent, that you are injured."

"What?" she gasped, confused. And wet.

"Just do it. Potter, send that poncy stag of yours to headquarters and tell Granger the name of this street. Tell her to hurry, we're going into battle." Draco's words were slurred with excitement as he pulled the flesh wand Harry had refused earlier out of his pocket and held it at the ready, standing on the balls of his toes, poised for some unseen attack.

"What are you talking about?" demanded Harry, on edge at seeing Draco suspended in his fighting stance. Scrambling to his feet, he pulled out his own wand, wondering if the bloody nutter's heightened sense of smell not only detected all forms of tea but also Death Eater BO.

"Just do as I say."

Tonks and Harry looked at each other, and shrugged. "_EXPECTO PATRONUM_!" Harry's stag galloped out of the street at ridiculous speeds and Tonks' ghostly werewolf, a sour reminder of Remus sudden departure, ran the short distance down the street and fazed through the guttering of number thirty. "I knew it was somewhere there." Said Tonks, glaring at the brickwork again.

"Okay, so explain." Demanded Harry.

"Simple. Andromeda is the secret keeper," said Draco.

"You're contradicting yourself," said Harry. "You said the spell was built on the bonds of trust. Why would Voldemort trust her to keep his secret?"

"My mum is not a terrorist," repeated Tonks, sending a sharp warning kick to Draco's shins that any more slander against her mother would not be tolerated.

"Oi, that hurt. Look, I'm not saying she is a terrorist. But the Dark Lord knows that there is a spy among his ranks, and he won't put his trust in any of the Death Eaters, especially after me. The man's not stupid, he'll learn from his mistakes. But he won't make himself the secret keeper because then he would become an open target for the spy."

"And it's my mum because…?" urged Tonks. She had stood up as well, her steps now on the balls of her feet, readying herself the most Draco's words made sense.

"Well it would make sense to tell the Muggle-lover," said Draco. He dodged another kick to the shin and continued heedlessly of the woman's scorn, "No one would think he'd tell a blood-traitor and as a captive, he can keep an eye on her. Why tell someone who has the freedom to wonder out and about on the streets telling everyone they meet on their travels when he has someone he can watch twenty-four seven without raising suspicion among his followers? Voldemort trusts his ability to keep her within his reach. We assumed she read the letter and was unable to reply the secret to us. She never got the letter, the Dark Lord did."

As the notion settled in, Harry became increasingly aware of the message that Tonks had sent into the row of houses. Spinning on the circle, Harry scanned the parameter, feeling like a started mouse. "Oh my god, we're all going to die," hissed Harry, kicking Draco's other shin. Draco hobbled about, laughing.

"Where's your sense of adventure, Potter?"

"Are you insane?" growled Tonks, her face growing wet again with horror, "There could be hundreds inside! There is only three of us!"

Draco went to reply, but then stopped. Harry followed Draco's gaze and saw the air that joined the two houses of Thirty and thirty-two, simmer , like the heat from tarmac.

Draco spun and roughly wacked Harry on top of the head with his wand before turning to point his wand at Tonks. As Tonks tripped over from her standstill and the horridly familiar feel of egg dribbled down his head, Harry watched Draco disappear under what must have been a very strong disillusionment charm. As Tonks tried to recover from the stinging hex and climb to his feet, a shot of light appeared from Draco's vicinity and the stinging hex made Tonks remain on the floor, yelping in shocked pain.

"Showtime!" whispered Draco gleefully.

**

TBC


	18. Chapter 18

**Chapter Eighteen**

The house did not miraculously appear as Harry thought it would, but rather, where the air thinned and warped about the brickwork, a foot immerged, quickly followed by a pale body. Andromeda looked like hell. She was dressed impeccably in a dark blue dress that contrasted against the paleness of her malnourished skin and stretched across the hollows of her hanging breasts. She scanned the street, her dark hair flying about her face in tangles until she spotted her daughter, yelping on the floor a few doors away.

"Dora!"

"Mum!"

Andromeda ran down the street, her voice horse as she babbled out a stream of nonsensical words. "- Oh god, thank god you're okay – thought no one would ever find me – where do you hurt? – please live, please –"

"Mum!...Mum…Mum, don't worry! Mum! It's only a stinging hex!" Tonks' words brought out a racked sob of relief from Andromeda's wasted body, and as the older woman began peppering kisses about her daughter's face, Harry felt something poke his side.

"Be ready!" whispered Draco. "Tonks! Tonks, get her to say the address."

"Mum. Mum, stop kissing me – Mum, I couldn't find the house. Where do we live, tell me our address!"

Tonks words were smothered under a rush of affection from her mother, but she kept repeating herself. The words seemed to sink in as Andromeda began whispering the words 'thirty one –' before a loud voice interrupted her.

"Where are you? Dromeda! Come here, you filthy – What The Hell Are You Doing?!" Lucius seemed to clock Tonks underneath Andromeda's crouched body and he instantly raised his wand. "Oh no you don't! AVADA KEDAVRA!"

Harry lurched forward as he green light rushed towards the two women on the floor, but he was too late. Draco's arms wrapped around him from somewhere, a hand tightly covering his mouth to stop all noise of protest until the only sounds in the street where Tonks' heart-wrenchingly loud screams as she tried to shake the life back into her mother's gaunt body that rested on top of her.

"MUM! MUM! MUUUM!"

"Lucius, what is going on…?" Snape's voice trailed off as he took in the scene in the street. His appearance was just as phenomenal as Andromeda's, but it went unnoticed as Tonks' screams had become hoarse begging.

"She was going to tell the auror the secret," said Lucius sedately, placing his wand away.

"Please, please….wake up…Mum….Mum, please…oh please…"

"Clean up that, would you, Severus? I'll take our new guest to our Lord."

"You can't just delegate jobs like that. How about you deal with the body and _I'll _ take the traitor inside," suggested Snape, his voice resentful from past situations. Lucius turned icily towards the other man and the squabble ensued.

"You think that just because you get invited for the Monday mead nights that you –"

"No, I think it is because I am much more valued by the Lord –"

"You're probably the spy –"

"You're just jealous that the Lord doesn't trust you enough to spy for him – thinks your soft, Lucius –"

"How dare yo –"

"Wait for it," whispered Draco into Harry's ear. His body was pressed in a warm line along Harry's back, but Harry found it hard to think about the nipples that were probably pressing into his shoulder blades when Tonks' wails were vibrating his ear drums. It was hurting. Her pitched had lowered, but Harry was sure the damage was already done because his ears were popping.

"MALFOY, DROP YOUR WAND AND PUT YOUR HANDS IN THE AIR!"

Harry spun around at the same time that Draco rapped him sharply on the head again, bringing colour and form back into their bodies. Hermione's voice was strong and clear as she held her wand aloft, aimed sure and true as the other members of The Order stood behind her, battle-ready.

"THIRTY ONE BENSLEY ROAD, LONDON!" yelled Snape, his voice echoing out to the park. Immediately Harry saw the missing house in question appear, obnoxiously pushing the neighbouring houses aside as it inflated into existence. Lucius turned on to Snape with rage etching over every feature, drawing his wand.

"YOU! You traitorous –"

"_DIFFINDO_!" Draco's aim failed from the distance and sliced deeply into the thickset wood of the front door, slashing the metal numbers of the house in half. Lucius' attention was divided by the two other Slytherins but the dilemma was quickly sorted when the front door of 'backwards-C – apostrophe' opened and out poured numerous death eaters, battle cries spilling into the air. Ron's red hair primarily caught Harry's eye as the aurors and members of the Order all rushed forward to meet their opponents, but soon the flash of ginger was lost in the rays of spells washing over head.

Through the commotion Harry saw Robert on the floor, trying to rescue Tonks' catatonic form from the pandemonium. He went to help when Draco pushed him hard in the other direction, "What are you doing, idiot? Go get Voldemort!"

It made sense. There was a prophesy and even though he had little faith in such things, he couldn't think of a single other person in the fray that he wanted to face the psychopathic madman. Draco pressed the flesh wand back into Harry's hand, and in the middle of a riot, it seemed crazy to give it back. "What about you?" asked Harry, about to offer his own wand.

"I'll acquire one somehow. Now hurry."

"What about you?"

"Oh, well I've got to kill my father." smiled Draco simply. There was blood in the cracks of his lips. "Now MOVE!"

They didn't kiss, or hug, or grasp hands because that would be like admitting that they weren't invincible. Harry headed through the mayhem, dodging the occasional severing hex fired his way, but generally weaved through the couples caught in battle and to make it to the front door. It was ajar and felt like trespassing, like breaking and entering into that old couple's home in Epping when Draco insisted the tenants were part albino bloodhound and needed to be captured urgently.

The hallway was empty. Harry thought that he would check about the downstairs rooms, but looking about the décor that must have been decorated by Andromeda, Harry decided to avoid the paisley and flower prints and head straight up the stairs.

It was called pathetic fallacy when it was about the weather, but Harry wasn't sure what it was called when it was about the wallpaper. The floral patterns had been changed to blank slate grey on the top landing and Harry had half hoped that it was Voldemort who had decorated downstairs. Meeting no adversaries so far, Harry went to the first bedroom and opened the door.

Bunk beds and a wardrobe full of uniform black cloaks were the only furnishing of the room. The walls were dingy and the smell of smoke and blood wafted strongly from the carpet. Harry checked for people and then left upon finding no one. The next room was similarly furnished, and Harry was thankful that bunk beds were not regulation for The Order's safehouse.

Back on the landing, Harry walked past a frosted window. He tried to look down into the street but all he saw was a hybrid of colours through the opaque glass.

"_What'sss a boy doing hhhhere?"_

Nagini's snout was poking out the far end of the corridor, head wedged in a narrow gap of the door. Aiming his wand with the intention to stun the stupid snake, a red beam shot out before he said a word and smacked the serpent between the eyes. Harry whistled and rolled the wand between his finger tips. "Hot damn."

" _Whosssse there my p-pet?"_ Harry felt his bladder clench. Sending one last glance back at the window, hoping to suddenly see a blond blob among the colours, Harry gathered his courage. "_Pet? Nagini, come back, my pet."_

Harry walked as softly as possible along the landing and nudged open the door that was omitting the encouraging hissing. Stepping over Nagini's dead length, Harry slipped through the door and was greeted by the most unusual sight he had ever seen.

Harry had half expected to see more bunk beds, but there was only one large king size in the corner. The main focal of the room was the large heath fire, large logs burning to make the room unbearably hot and a large winged back chair, of deepest green, was drawn close to the flames.

In the chair sat the object of Harry's nightmares, the terror of his childhood, the murderer of his parents…in a terrycloth dressing gown that flashed rice-paper skin stretched across knobbly knees.

Harry had never had to contemplate his enemy owning such mundane things as knees. But looked at Voldemort, huddled by the fire because he'd probably become so reptilian he could no long produce his own body heat, bald and wrapped in his comfort clothes like week old cod in newspaper…Harry realised how old the man…snake-man was. Eighty. About eighty, give or take a few years, and not all of those years living.

"_Nagini?"_

Red eyes raised slowly from the fire as the head began to turn towards the door that Harry stood in. Harry couldn't help but notice how the light reflected off that shiny scalp, before he came to his senses and swished his wand through the air. _"SECTUMSEMPRA!..._oh…err…"

**

Draco couldn't help laughing. It hurt somewhere deep inside to see the look on Potter's face; like a naughty boy caught burning ants with his practise wand.

"I didn't mean to do that, honest Hermione."

Granger seemed a little at lost about which sort of reprimand to follow with, and merely stood dumbfounded at the scene. She was blinking a lot and her hair was quivering with mirth unbeknownst to the head it was attached to.

"We should take a picture," suggested Draco, feeling that such a moment should be preserved forever.

"Oh, very dignified," hissed Harry. Draco raised an eyebrow and smirked.

"Do you think I will get a special reward for being your practise dummy before you did this?"

"It's hardly the same thing!" cried Potter, distressed. "I didn't know what it did then. And…and this didn't happen to you. And…" Potter was turning a funny colour and Draco wanted to do Gryffindorish things, but his pride kept him still. "And I'm glad I didn't because I like you a lot."

"Well I'm glad you didn't too because I think my body would mourn the loss of my wonderful face." Draco could feel the giggles rising up in him as he looked over at Voldemort's corpse. Feeling elevation riddling up every part of his being as he looked at Voldemort's shocked face that was held upside down in his own hands, as if he was surprised to have caught his own head.

He could feel the freedom, taste the better world that was far off in the future.

"Please can we take a picture. It would make a brilliant advert; _Ban the Bully_!" Draco gave a beseeching look to Granger. She just shrugged, unsure of any procedure.

**

Stepping out into the street, Potter began letting out little gasps that had nothing to do with public indecency, as though the thoroughly unimpressive death of the Dark Lord was made up for by the carnage in is absence. "Oh god…"

"Cheer up, we've won," soothed Draco, elbowing Potter in the ribs and pointing to his father. Prone on the tarmac of middle Muggle London, Lucius sat awkwardly on account of his two broken legs. They were splayed at funny angles, but unlike the spread legs of a lover of a suicide jumper, the angles radiated from half way down his thighs as though someone had come along and snapped his femurs like a wish bone.

Weasley was fisting a collection of flesh wands he was confiscated off of fallen Death Eaters, making his way to Lucius, yanking it out of the man's crippled swollen hand when he was met with spitting resistance. "You'll all die, you'll all pay for what you did, you traitors! Wait until my master comes, he'll kill you all – like cockroaches!"

Draco gave Potter a wink and went over to his father, pulling something out of his pocket. "Hey, dad. Check this out." Flinging the Polaroid into Lucius' lap, he turned back to Potter and smiled, "Fancy going and finding a cuppa?"

"Sure thing," replied Harry as they walked away, Lucius' almost-manly crying in the background. "I hope that's the only copy of that picture."

"Of course," replied Draco, smiling serenely, patting his breast pocket discretely.

**

"Can't you do that more quietly?"

"And how do you suppose I do that?" hissed Harry, the door creaking under his spells.

The golden moment of silence was broken fairly quickly. "…Hurry up."

"Shuddup." Harry was trying to concentrate on breaking the wards, each layer more complicated than the next, and the job made even more problematic by his partner pressing against his back. Touching his arms, thighs, bum and belt loops. "Do you mind? You're not helping."

A hand strayed into his boxers in reply.

Finally the wards fell and then a quick _Alohomora _on the chains that were wrapped around the front door, they entered the building quietly.

"ECHO!"

"Shush!"

"E-E-ECHOOOOO!"

"Malfoy!"

"What? We're inside the Fidelius, no one will hear. In fact, I say we make more noise. You know, just to check the charm is working…what do you think?"

"Oh!"

"Yeah…Bend over."

"Bedroom."

"Nah, here."

"Bed. Room."

"Prude."

**

_Brilliant arse. _Draco had to give it to the man, Potter had a wonderful backside. Especially when it was bent over as he tried to struggle out of his socks. Quickly divesting himself of his own clothes, boxers flung with particular exuberance in his haste to feel the humid air press against his skin, Draco moved forward and pressed the hard length of his body along Harry's behind. A small gasp of surprise was almost reward enough, but the feel of Potter's thighs clenching around his cock as he slid himself forward through the small vee under that perfectly formed arse was the topping on the cake.

"So Mister Potter," began Draco, his voice taking on an authoritive note as he began to conduct an interview, "How do you feel now that you have defeat all the world's evil and bagged yourself the best looking bloke too?"

"Well, good." Said Harry, spinning about and using the front of his thighs instead to do some very interesting things. Pressing his lips to Draco's throat, he continued, "But frankly I feel about under appreciated."

"Oh, and why is that?"

"Ah, well that 'best looking blonde' won't put out." Sighed Harry, grinning. Draco made a funny squeaking sound. "I feel like I haven't been paid my due…for being a hero, I mean."

"Oh," Growled Draco, extremely put off about the prudish implications being cast on his character. "And what would be in your due?"

"Oh, you know. A nice blonde fan-boy, getting down on his knees, begging and fawning over me." Harry gave an exaggerated sigh, and then a wide grin as Draco shrugged nonchalantly and banged his kneecaps on the wooden floor. Big grey eyes peered up at him, eyelashes fluttering like a 1940's movie star, and a shit eating grin.

"Oh mister Potter, you're such an inspiration!" Harry almost snorted at the falsetto voice that sounded remarkably like Justin "We are so indebted to you! Oh how, how can we make it up to you? I'll do _anything_. Please, use my supple, bendy body as you will – take me now, oh wonderful hero!"

Harry tried to contain himself, but he betrayed himself when he squeaked "Suck me, fanboy!"

"God, Potter, I think it is time to reel in your imagination. Next thing you know, you'll actually think you are someone famous or something. Pfft." Draco went to place his mouth over Harry's cock but Harry delayed him, pressing a finger into the middle of the blonde fringe to press him away.

"Let's do this on the bed."

"…This isn't a honeymoon."

"I know!" Harry sniffed. "I just bruise easily."

**

Justin frowned as he looked into the stone basin. It had come by three exhausted owls, wrapped in gaudy pink paper with a bow on top. It looked the same, but he didn't trust bloody Draco Malfoy as far as he could hex the bastard. The strands of red that were swirling on the surface of his memories told him that something had been recently added.

Cautiously curious, Justin leaned forward and pressed his face into the misty liquid. Instantly he regretted his inquisitiveness.

It was horrible, seeing two of past lovers writhing on the bed, moaning and thrusting towards one another. The tones of their skins contrasting in the green tint of the leafy morning, hands gripping each other tightly, hips meeting with loud slaps that echoed with the groans of ecstasy.

And then Malfoy looked towards him. He almost forgot that both of them were just two wisps on memories because he felt himself tense as Malfoy seemed to look him right in the eye.

"Bet he didn't ever let you do this, eh." Malfoy punctuated his words with a harsh thrust into the body beneath him, and then he winked and inclined his head down to Harry. Beautiful Harry who had his legs spread like a slut, grabbing his knees to hold himself wider for the vile Slytherin. "Do you think he looks like a frog in this position?"

Harry looked up then, looking at Draco, "What did you just say?"

"Oh, nothing. Relax." Draco smirked and Justin felt the world close in around him as the memory ended, the image of Harry arched up from the mattress in pleasure the last thing in his mind.

That and Draco bloody Malfoy's triumphant smile.

**

"See. I told you."

Harry folded his newspaper and looked across the table. "What?" he asked.

"Simultaneous orgasms." Stated Draco. "That's the proof. We _are _the Kings of Sex."

Harry thought about the sex they had had last night. And this morning. And in the shower. And in the kitchen. And he thought that maybe he could finally enjoy life now that Voldemort was dead and he was in the company of the people he preferred. "I don't think so. We should practise more."

Draco smiled at him and took a sip out of his cup, nodding. "Yes, yes, you're probably right. Can't be too careful. Here, pass me the paper."

Harry handed over his newspaper silently, and began about making himself a cup of tea. Draco coughed a little as he flapped open the newspaper ostentatiously and pointedly turned towards the centre pages. He held the paper aloft in front of his face, opting to display the front page headlines to Harry than make a hand free to clutch a teacup.

"Did you give Justin back his pensieve?" asked Harry, not wanting to have random ex's turning up in the middle of his new relationship.

"Course."

Harry didn't see the smirk that was hidden by the newspaper as he poured milk into his cup. The greenery of the balcony covering reflecting in the hot beverage, the handle moist from the heat of the country, Harry couldn't help glancing at the headlines.

"_Dark Lord Defeated._

_Harry Potter Missing."_

The photo that accompanied the article was a familiar picture; Draco stood with his arm around a pale corpse's shoulders, grinning widely while he held Voldemort's head aloft like the Quidditch World Cup, sending out winks to the readers of the Prophet. Harry saw himself in the picture, standing behind the grinning maniac, shaking his head in exasperation with an obsessively hungry look glinting in his eye at Draco's back.

Harry felt embarrassed at being caught with such an expression on his face, it seemed so unlike him to look like that. Surely he had been carried away in the moment.

"You said you'd gave the only copy to your father."

"I lied. Drink your tea." Draco rustled the newspaper higher over his face.

Harry looked down onto the cobbled streets below the balcony and tried to think of something that would convey to Draco how happy he was to be free and back to the place he'd spent some of his happiest months. "I like coffee."

**

End

A/N: Right, well there you go, that's the end of the story. Many thanks to _Faerylark_ who came up with the idea of giving the pensieve back to Justin. Hope you all enjoyed the story, please feel free to leave a review if you liked it – I'm replying to all reviews now that it is over. Bye! x


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